America’s Environmental Protection Agency “granted permission for genetically engineered mosquitoes to be released into the Florida Keys and around Houston to see if they can help limit the spread of mosquito-borne illnesses,” writes Bloomberg Environment.
clovis (Slashdot reader #4,684) shared their report on ab experimental use permit granted to British biotech company Oxitec Ltd:
Oxitec’s first field trial in Brazil achieved up to a 96% suppression of target disease transmitting mosquito populations in dense urban settings, the company said. But in public comments on the permit approval docket, Jaydee Hanson, policy director at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Food Safety, questioned Oxitec’s claims and warned of other possible dangers.
“Most (but not all) of the GE mosquitoes’ offspring die at the late larval stage, in the water where the female mosquitoes lay their eggs,” Hanson wrote.”This partial survival rate, even if low (a reported 3 to 4% in laboratory conditions), would lead to the establishment of hybrid mosquitoes in the environment, which might possess altered properties, including the potential for enhanced disease transmission or resistance to insecticides,” Hanson said.
The U.S. agency said it “looks forward to receiving field test results regarding the effectiveness of this promising new tool that could help combat the spread of mosquito-borne diseases like the Zika virus.”
of this story at Slashdot.
Source:: Slashdot