A group of international scientists at the Imperial College of London are working on research whose outcome could stop the spread of one of the world’s deadliest diseases—malaria.
Using the gene drive technology, the scientists are inserting into thousands of mosquitoes genes from a frog a honey bee, which will kill the malaria parasite inside the mosquito.
They will intend to release these genetically modified mosquitoes into the wild, and they will mate with natural mosquitoes and produce offspring that carry the modified genes.
The research, which is in an advanced stage, is being led by Professor George Christophides of the Imperial College of London. He explained what to expect.
“What we have done here is to make the mosquitoes not be infected with malaria,” he told Reuters news agency So they cannot be infected with malaria; they cannot transmit malaria.”
The research is in two stages. “The first stage is to make mosquitoes unable to transmit the malaria parasite, and the second stage is to ensure future generations of mosquitoes inherit the gene,” Prof Christophides said.
Scientists think if this works, it would revolutionise the fight against malaria, one of the world’s most deadly diseases.
In 2023, the tropical disease killed 600,000 people, most of them in Africa, and three-quarters of them were children below five years.
The fight against malaria has taken different paths: from using mosquito nets to introducing drugs and then vaccines, these solutions have only worked partially.
Traditional methods of treatment are also becoming ineffective with the parasite increasingly resisting drugs.
Despite the measures invested to fight against malaria, the disease has kept spreading, infecting 249 million new people in 2022, according to the WHO.
“We need new technologies; we need new ideas; we need something that will not need us to be there all the time and do the job – something that will propagate itself, a sustainable technology,” said Prof Christophides.
The research will take years to conclude, as the scientists are ensuring that the genetically modified mosquitoes pose no threat to the natural environment or human beings.
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