9 ms·

'Miraculous' mosquito hack cuts dengue by 77%

296 points by Zenst 5y ago

Mengkudulangsat 5y ago
Wolbachia. That name rings an ominous bell [1] https://metalgear.fandom.com/wiki/Wolbachia https://metalgear.fandom.com/wiki/Wolbachia
riffraff 5y ago
> Wolbachia are also spectacularly manipulative and can alter the fertility of their hosts to ensure they are passed on to the next generation of mosquitoes. is this a nice way of saying "the end result is more mosquitoes, but without dengue" ?
- ComodoHacker 5y ago
  It means the infected ones could prevail in their population without the need to artificially grow and release more of them. All the usual limiting factors are still there, so no, there won't be much more of them. Except if these bacteria give some yet unknown benefits to this species of mosquitos.
  - riffraff 5y ago
    ah, makes sense, thank you.
macintux 5y ago
For anyone unfamiliar with dengue, among its more notorious aspects is that repeated infections over a victim’s lifetime can make its impact worse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_fever https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_fever Very happy to hear this news. Selfishly, with a warming climate the impact of the virus is likely to spread, and generally the more tropical diseases we can wipe out the better.
- Vecr 5y ago
  The vaccine causes Antibody-Dependent Enhancement (ADE) as well as natural infection [0], so the situation as a whole is not very good. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_vaccine#CYD-TDV_(Dengvaxia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_vaccine#CYD-TDV_(Dengva...
- krrrh 5y ago
  This fact makes the stat from the article all the more alarming. > In 1970, only nine countries had faced severe dengue outbreaks, now there are up to 400 million infections a year. It amazes me to think of how relatively small the team that worked on this was in relation to the outsized benefit to humanity.
  - midasuni 5y ago
    Far more people working on male pattern baldness cures
  - Gibbon1 5y ago
    That's public heath in a nutshell.
    - BBC-vs-neolibs 5y ago
      as opposed to?
- the_af 5y ago
  > For anyone unfamiliar with dengue, among its more notorious aspects is that repeated infections over a victim’s lifetime can make its impact worse. One really minor nitpick, but I think it's different strains of dengue that get you: get infected by one, and you get resistance for that strain, but also become more susceptible to develop complications or die from a separate strain.
  - travisjungroth 5y ago
    I was lucky enough to get the non-hemorrhaging type. But now if I get the hemorrhaging type it will be extra bad. So that's lame.
fighterpilot 5y ago
Grateful to Bill and Melinda Gates for funding this.
- ComodoHacker 5y ago
  Are you sure they fund this particular team?
- alisonkisk 5y ago
  And especially to Windows purchasers who funded Bill and Melinda!
  - hendry 5y ago
    I feel selfish for trying to get a refund for all those Microsoft licenses I paid for buying PCs that I never used.
    - danuker 5y ago
      You can get the refund and donate directly to their foundation.[1] But be mindful of what a charity can be used for.[2] [1] https://www.gatesfoundation.org/philanthropypartners/donate https://www.gatesfoundation.org/philanthropypartners/donate [2] https://www.economica.id/2021/05/30/there-is-no-such-thing-as-a-free-gift/ https://www.economica.id/2021/05/30/there-is-no-such-thing-a...
      - eru 5y ago
        The best/worst that economica article seems to be able to come up with is a 'lack of democracy'.
    - whereistimbo 5y ago
      Did you succeed? Would you like to donate it to me instead please?
55555 5y ago
Please change title to: 1 Weird Trick Mosquitos Hate
- craftinator 5y ago
  Thank you SO much for this! Was really the chuckle I needed today.
- mpaepper 5y ago
  Alternatively: "Mosquitos hate this trick"
- seattle_spring 5y ago
  Mosquitos in <your city> can save 77% on their mortgage with this little known secret.
bryceacc 5y ago
well i guess this is fantastic to avoid the argument against eradicating all mosquitos as a whole since they may be part of a food chain or something. It just prevents the disease from transmitting!
- macintux 5y ago
  I don’t think anyone’s arguing we should eradicate all mosquitos, just the ones that carry human diseases (which IIRC are in many cases non-native species).
- andreareina 5y ago
  I haven't seen serious arguments for eradicating all mosquitoes, but just the species that spreads it, which is a small portion of the total mosquito population and doesn't occupy a unique ecological niche. Earnest question: what's the bigger ecological change, infecting all these mosquitoes (can they spread it to other species? We've seen evidence of mosquitoes hybridizing in the wild), or just kill them outright?
  - Fomite 5y ago
    We have very few (if any) species-specific pesticides or larvicides. We've been trying the "What if we just kill them outright?" approach to mosquito control (along with 'What if we can hide under nets', 'What if we trick them into biting something else first?', etc.) fairly extensively.
- carlmr 5y ago
  On the one hand we don't have data still for how eradicating mosquitoes would disturb the ecosystem, there are just too many complex interactions. There are probably plenty of species specializing on preying on mosquitoes out there that we don't know of. However currently humanity is killing off a lot of insects without targeting a specific species, so potentially disturbing mosquito based ecosystems doesn't seem terrible in comparison.
  - IntrepidWorm 5y ago
canada_dry 5y ago
In related news, we should start to see results from the genetically modified mosquitoes released in the Florida Keys. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/first-genetically-modified-mosquitoes-released-in-u-s-are-hatching-now/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/first-genetically...
- konschubert 5y ago
  really looking forward to this
- cmpb 5y ago
  > How safe is this technology? > It’s extremely safe. The EPA has done its due diligence and tested many of the potential side effects of this technology. The real question here is: What are the existing control mechanisms that are in place? This mosquito has been controlled using many different broad-spectrum insecticides in Florida, including pyrethroids that also kill honeybees, ladybugs, dragonflies and other insects. Pictures show aerial spraying of insecticides from airplanes over neighborhoods in Florida during the Zika virus outbreak in 2016. By comparison, Oxitec’s technology is extremely safe. It’s only going to target A. aegypti, and you’re using the mosquito to control the mosquito. Wow, hell of a deflection. I am genuinely curious about the biotech company's perspective on the potential risks of what they're doing, and all they can say is that other methods have risks as well?
xipho 5y ago
Any time I read "kills 99% of germs" or "cuts by 77%" I think, nice, that's some strong selective pressure to help us evolve more resistant <insert things that annoy Homo sapiens>. Particularly bad in agriculture where there pests have evolved resistance multiple times. That said, eliminating Polio, etc. are examples of where things really worked out, so it can happen, YRMV.
- riffraff 5y ago
  As someone said: every time you kill a spider you're selecting for faster, sneakier spiders.
  - warlog 5y ago
    And releasing predation pressure on mosquitoes.
  - jspash 5y ago
    I like to think the ones that are left prefer to remain unseen. And to me those are the best kind of spiders.
- andrewflnr 5y ago
  The wolbachia can evolve too. Even an arms race between them is probably better than status quo.
- onion2k 5y ago
  Doesn't it depend on what "99%" means? If a cleaning agent will kill 100% of 99% species of bacteria then there'll be nothing left except the bacteria that's already resistant to the agent and nothing will evolve new resistance. On the other hand, if it kills 99% of 100% of species of bacteria then you're right, the resistant ones will remain and could evolve in to a fully resistant species.
  - pjerem 5y ago
    It doesn’t matter because bacteria species are always fighting each other. So even if in your 99%, you kill 100% of a specific species, the 1% species left, whatever they are, have now plenty of free environment to proliferate. Yes it can be a good outcome if the resistant ones are not pathogens but the thing is that you don’t know and probabilities are that the pathogens / total won’t change.
seizethegdgap 5y ago
Another well deserved entry in the 'Stop Using The Word "Hack" To Describe Medical Research Challenge 2021'.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
molyss 5y ago
Looks like it’s also an interesting area of research for malaria control. Both diseases are transmitted by mosquito bites. Malaria is a parasite while dengue is a virus. There seem to be twice as many dengue infection a year than malaria cases, but 10x more death from malaria than from dengue. The fact that the « hack » transmits through generation is pretty amazing too https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6237385/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6237385/
evjan 5y ago
Wow! I was involved in creating an app for the mosquito people in the field and the researchers for this project many years ago. So happy it's finally showing awesome results!
_user112 5y ago
It's almost as if Germ theory is an incomplete model. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT!? I F*CKING LOVE SCIENCE !!11!!1
brownbat 5y ago
This is weird to read as if it's a sudden new discovery, I had the impression wolbachia was well established as part of the toolkit. Thorough history of mosquito control techniques and where we stand today, including some comparisons of pros / cons / applicability: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28869513/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28869513/
- adrianh 5y ago
  This exact technique (putting wolbachia in mosquitoes to combat dengue fever) was also covered in the excellent book “I Contain Multitudes.” Highly recommended — super well written, deeply researched and interesting.
raynr 5y ago
Me before reading the article: is it wolbachia? Me after reading the article: it's wolbachia. We've been using these here in Singapore for a while now (looking at it since about 2016 [0]), and it's not like it was a secret [1], hell even the BBC has reported on wolbachia before (by the same James Gallagher!) [2], so it's a bit surprising that it is presented in this BBC article as something "miraculous" and new. What's curious to me is that the information presented in the BBC articles is slightly different from what has been reported here in Singapore. The BBC articles say that the wolbachia infection is passed on. Our reporting has been that male mosquitos infected with wolbachia that mate with females will not produce viable eggs, but otherwise, infected females will pass the wolbachia infection on. I wonder what the details are. [0] https://www.nea.gov.sg/corporate-functions/resources/research/wolbachia-aedes-mosquito-suppression-strategy https://www.nea.gov.sg/corporate-functions/resources/researc... [1] https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/wolbachia-mosquitoes-new-facility-aedes-aegypti-dengue-12145012 https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/wolbachia-mos... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/health-50487724 https://www.bbc.com/news/health-50487724
- nomoreusernames 5y ago
  its for the clicks. you would think that at least they would say 'hey we are cool, we reported on this before, you should trust us more' but no i think 'hey new discovery, you are living in the future now, we have it first, click here' seems to sell more.
  - signal11 5y ago
    Counterpoint: I read this article and the 2019 BBC piece, this one reports the result of a large scale study which has very positive results. Vs the 2019 article which describes a promising technique with relatively smaller trials. Even lay people who know Wolbachia is promising will find the result interesting. Also the “miraculous” in the headline comes from a a researcher who described Wolbachia as naturally miraculous. I’d say that makes it fair game for a headline writer. The newer article should have mentioned that this technique has been trialled before and provided some context about why this trial is important, eg it was a 3 year RCT, and the evidence it presents is of a higher standard, etc. But that doesn’t detract from the fact that this result is useful and worth a new report — and in fact the “explore further” link on the page on the topic of Mosquitoes links to previous stories on the topic, including the story the previous commenter mentioned. Science and health journalism (other than COVID) isn’t always as sexy as other areas of journalism, I think we should be a little wary of crying “clickbait” for everything. A victory over dengue is worth shouting about — it’s a nasty disease that causes a lot of suffering.
xutopia 5y ago
Does dengue have reservoirs that are not human?

296 points by Zenst 5y ago

Wolbachia. That name rings an ominous bell [1] https://metalgear.fandom.com/wiki/Wolbachia https://metalgear.fandom.com/wiki/Wolbachia

riffraff 5y ago

> Wolbachia are also spectacularly manipulative and can alter the fertility of their hosts to ensure they are passed on to the next generation of mosquitoes. is this a nice way of saying "the end result is more mosquitoes, but without dengue" ?

ComodoHacker 5y ago
It means the infected ones could prevail in their population without the need to artificially grow and release more of them. All the usual limiting factors are still there, so no, there won't be much more of them. Except if these bacteria give some yet unknown benefits to this species of mosquitos.
- riffraff 5y ago
  ah, makes sense, thank you.

macintux 5y ago

For anyone unfamiliar with dengue, among its more notorious aspects is that repeated infections over a victim’s lifetime can make its impact worse. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_fever https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_fever Very happy to hear this news. Selfishly, with a warming climate the impact of the virus is likely to spread, and generally the more tropical diseases we can wipe out the better.

Vecr 5y ago
The vaccine causes Antibody-Dependent Enhancement (ADE) as well as natural infection [0], so the situation as a whole is not very good. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_vaccine#CYD-TDV_(Dengvaxia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue_vaccine#CYD-TDV_(Dengva...
krrrh 5y ago
This fact makes the stat from the article all the more alarming. > In 1970, only nine countries had faced severe dengue outbreaks, now there are up to 400 million infections a year. It amazes me to think of how relatively small the team that worked on this was in relation to the outsized benefit to humanity.
- midasuni 5y ago
  Far more people working on male pattern baldness cures
- Gibbon1 5y ago
  That's public heath in a nutshell.
  - BBC-vs-neolibs 5y ago
    as opposed to?
the_af 5y ago
> For anyone unfamiliar with dengue, among its more notorious aspects is that repeated infections over a victim’s lifetime can make its impact worse. One really minor nitpick, but I think it's different strains of dengue that get you: get infected by one, and you get resistance for that strain, but also become more susceptible to develop complications or die from a separate strain.
- travisjungroth 5y ago
  I was lucky enough to get the non-hemorrhaging type. But now if I get the hemorrhaging type it will be extra bad. So that's lame.

fighterpilot 5y ago

Grateful to Bill and Melinda Gates for funding this.

ComodoHacker 5y ago
Are you sure they fund this particular team?
alisonkisk 5y ago
And especially to Windows purchasers who funded Bill and Melinda!
- hendry 5y ago
  I feel selfish for trying to get a refund for all those Microsoft licenses I paid for buying PCs that I never used.
  - danuker 5y ago
    You can get the refund and donate directly to their foundation.[1] But be mindful of what a charity can be used for.[2] [1] https://www.gatesfoundation.org/philanthropypartners/donate https://www.gatesfoundation.org/philanthropypartners/donate [2] https://www.economica.id/2021/05/30/there-is-no-such-thing-as-a-free-gift/ https://www.economica.id/2021/05/30/there-is-no-such-thing-a...
    - eru 5y ago
      The best/worst that economica article seems to be able to come up with is a 'lack of democracy'.
  - whereistimbo 5y ago
    Did you succeed? Would you like to donate it to me instead please?

55555 5y ago

Please change title to: 1 Weird Trick Mosquitos Hate

craftinator 5y ago
Thank you SO much for this! Was really the chuckle I needed today.
mpaepper 5y ago
Alternatively: "Mosquitos hate this trick"
seattle_spring 5y ago
Mosquitos in <your city> can save 77% on their mortgage with this little known secret.

bryceacc 5y ago

well i guess this is fantastic to avoid the argument against eradicating all mosquitos as a whole since they may be part of a food chain or something. It just prevents the disease from transmitting!

macintux 5y ago
I don’t think anyone’s arguing we should eradicate all mosquitos, just the ones that carry human diseases (which IIRC are in many cases non-native species).
andreareina 5y ago
I haven't seen serious arguments for eradicating all mosquitoes, but just the species that spreads it, which is a small portion of the total mosquito population and doesn't occupy a unique ecological niche. Earnest question: what's the bigger ecological change, infecting all these mosquitoes (can they spread it to other species? We've seen evidence of mosquitoes hybridizing in the wild), or just kill them outright?
- Fomite 5y ago
  We have very few (if any) species-specific pesticides or larvicides. We've been trying the "What if we just kill them outright?" approach to mosquito control (along with 'What if we can hide under nets', 'What if we trick them into biting something else first?', etc.) fairly extensively.
carlmr 5y ago
On the one hand we don't have data still for how eradicating mosquitoes would disturb the ecosystem, there are just too many complex interactions. There are probably plenty of species specializing on preying on mosquitoes out there that we don't know of. However currently humanity is killing off a lot of insects without targeting a specific species, so potentially disturbing mosquito based ecosystems doesn't seem terrible in comparison.
- IntrepidWorm 5y ago

canada_dry 5y ago

In related news, we should start to see results from the genetically modified mosquitoes released in the Florida Keys. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/first-genetically-modified-mosquitoes-released-in-u-s-are-hatching-now/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/first-genetically...

konschubert 5y ago
really looking forward to this
cmpb 5y ago
> How safe is this technology? > It’s extremely safe. The EPA has done its due diligence and tested many of the potential side effects of this technology. The real question here is: What are the existing control mechanisms that are in place? This mosquito has been controlled using many different broad-spectrum insecticides in Florida, including pyrethroids that also kill honeybees, ladybugs, dragonflies and other insects. Pictures show aerial spraying of insecticides from airplanes over neighborhoods in Florida during the Zika virus outbreak in 2016. By comparison, Oxitec’s technology is extremely safe. It’s only going to target A. aegypti, and you’re using the mosquito to control the mosquito. Wow, hell of a deflection. I am genuinely curious about the biotech company's perspective on the potential risks of what they're doing, and all they can say is that other methods have risks as well?

xipho 5y ago

Any time I read "kills 99% of germs" or "cuts by 77%" I think, nice, that's some strong selective pressure to help us evolve more resistant <insert things that annoy Homo sapiens>. Particularly bad in agriculture where there pests have evolved resistance multiple times. That said, eliminating Polio, etc. are examples of where things really worked out, so it can happen, YRMV.

riffraff 5y ago
As someone said: every time you kill a spider you're selecting for faster, sneakier spiders.
- warlog 5y ago
  And releasing predation pressure on mosquitoes.
- jspash 5y ago
  I like to think the ones that are left prefer to remain unseen. And to me those are the best kind of spiders.
andrewflnr 5y ago
The wolbachia can evolve too. Even an arms race between them is probably better than status quo.
onion2k 5y ago
Doesn't it depend on what "99%" means? If a cleaning agent will kill 100% of 99% species of bacteria then there'll be nothing left except the bacteria that's already resistant to the agent and nothing will evolve new resistance. On the other hand, if it kills 99% of 100% of species of bacteria then you're right, the resistant ones will remain and could evolve in to a fully resistant species.
- pjerem 5y ago
  It doesn’t matter because bacteria species are always fighting each other. So even if in your 99%, you kill 100% of a specific species, the 1% species left, whatever they are, have now plenty of free environment to proliferate. Yes it can be a good outcome if the resistant ones are not pathogens but the thing is that you don’t know and probabilities are that the pathogens / total won’t change.

seizethegdgap 5y ago

Another well deserved entry in the 'Stop Using The Word "Hack" To Describe Medical Research Challenge 2021'.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

molyss 5y ago

Looks like it’s also an interesting area of research for malaria control. Both diseases are transmitted by mosquito bites. Malaria is a parasite while dengue is a virus. There seem to be twice as many dengue infection a year than malaria cases, but 10x more death from malaria than from dengue. The fact that the « hack » transmits through generation is pretty amazing too https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6237385/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6237385/

evjan 5y ago

Wow! I was involved in creating an app for the mosquito people in the field and the researchers for this project many years ago. So happy it's finally showing awesome results!

_user112 5y ago

It's almost as if Germ theory is an incomplete model. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT!? I F*CKING LOVE SCIENCE !!11!!1

brownbat 5y ago

This is weird to read as if it's a sudden new discovery, I had the impression wolbachia was well established as part of the toolkit. Thorough history of mosquito control techniques and where we stand today, including some comparisons of pros / cons / applicability: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28869513/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28869513/

adrianh 5y ago
This exact technique (putting wolbachia in mosquitoes to combat dengue fever) was also covered in the excellent book “I Contain Multitudes.” Highly recommended — super well written, deeply researched and interesting.

raynr 5y ago

Me before reading the article: is it wolbachia? Me after reading the article: it's wolbachia. We've been using these here in Singapore for a while now (looking at it since about 2016 [0]), and it's not like it was a secret [1], hell even the BBC has reported on wolbachia before (by the same James Gallagher!) [2], so it's a bit surprising that it is presented in this BBC article as something "miraculous" and new. What's curious to me is that the information presented in the BBC articles is slightly different from what has been reported here in Singapore. The BBC articles say that the wolbachia infection is passed on. Our reporting has been that male mosquitos infected with wolbachia that mate with females will not produce viable eggs, but otherwise, infected females will pass the wolbachia infection on. I wonder what the details are. [0] https://www.nea.gov.sg/corporate-functions/resources/research/wolbachia-aedes-mosquito-suppression-strategy https://www.nea.gov.sg/corporate-functions/resources/researc... [1] https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/wolbachia-mosquitoes-new-facility-aedes-aegypti-dengue-12145012 https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/wolbachia-mos... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/health-50487724 https://www.bbc.com/news/health-50487724

nomoreusernames 5y ago
its for the clicks. you would think that at least they would say 'hey we are cool, we reported on this before, you should trust us more' but no i think 'hey new discovery, you are living in the future now, we have it first, click here' seems to sell more.
- signal11 5y ago
  Counterpoint: I read this article and the 2019 BBC piece, this one reports the result of a large scale study which has very positive results. Vs the 2019 article which describes a promising technique with relatively smaller trials. Even lay people who know Wolbachia is promising will find the result interesting. Also the “miraculous” in the headline comes from a a researcher who described Wolbachia as naturally miraculous. I’d say that makes it fair game for a headline writer. The newer article should have mentioned that this technique has been trialled before and provided some context about why this trial is important, eg it was a 3 year RCT, and the evidence it presents is of a higher standard, etc. But that doesn’t detract from the fact that this result is useful and worth a new report — and in fact the “explore further” link on the page on the topic of Mosquitoes links to previous stories on the topic, including the story the previous commenter mentioned. Science and health journalism (other than COVID) isn’t always as sexy as other areas of journalism, I think we should be a little wary of crying “clickbait” for everything. A victory over dengue is worth shouting about — it’s a nasty disease that causes a lot of suffering.

xutopia 5y ago

Does dengue have reservoirs that are not human?