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Warming linked to spread of zika virus

February 5, 2016

Warming linked to spread of zika virus

CROP-- Aedes_aegypti

The Aedes egypti mosquito has now spread to 80% of Brazil.
Image: James Gathany via Wikimedia Commons

Scientists believe that record average temperatures may be helping to create an environment that has led to big increases in the number of disease-carrying mosquitoes.

SÃO PAULO, 5 February, 2016 – The Zika virus, transmitted by the same mosquito as dengue fever, has spread with alarming speed throughout South and Central America – and scientists in Brazil suspect that global warming is exacerbating the problem.

Although the virus, named after the Ugandan forest where it was first identified, usually causes only mild symptoms and often passes undetected, it has been associated with a surge in the number of cases of babies born with microcephaly, which can cause brain damage.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has now declared the situation an international public health emergency.

The numbers are alarming. Until last year, while dengue fever claimed many victims, Zika was unknown in Latin America. Since first detected in April 2014, there have been over 4,000 births of babies with suspected microcephaly in Brazil, compared with a previous yearly average of 154.

Twenty-four countries in South and Central America have reported cases of microcephaly, and the rapid spread of the virus is being attributed by some scientists to global warming.

Abnormal warming

Last year was the hottest on record, with temperatures for the first time about 1°C above pre-industrial levels. But in some parts of Brazil, average temperatures rose by between 3° and 5°C, according to data from the Centre for Weather Forecasting and Climate Studies at Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research. The abnormal warming of the Pacific caused by El Niño contributed to this.

Studies by Brazilian scientists show that the Aedes egypti mosquito has spread to 80% of the country, an area of 6.9 million sq km (2.6 million square miles) − four times larger than a decade ago.

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Genetically Modified Mosquito Sparks a Controversy in Florida

June 5, 2015

Genetically Modified Mosquito Sparks a Controversy in Florida

Officials in the Florida Keys are seeking to use a GM mosquito that could help prevent a recurrence of dengue fever there. But fears among some residents — which scientists say are unfounded — are slowing the release of mosquitoes whose offspring are genetically programmed to die.


When people think of genetically modified organisms, food crops like GM corn and soybeans usually come to mind. But engineering more complex living things is now possible, and the controversy surrounding genetic modification has now spread to the lowly mosquito, which is being

aedes aegypti

Marcos Teixeira de Freitas/Flickr
An Aedes aegypti mosquito, the species that primarily transmits dengue fever.

genetically engineered to control mosquito-borne illnesses.

A U.K.-based company, Oxitec, has altered two genes in theAedes aegypti mosquito so that when modified males breed with wild females, the offspring inherit a lethal gene and die in the larval stage. The state agency that controls mosquitos in the Florida Keys is awaiting approval from the federal government of a trial release of Oxitec’s genetically modified mosquitos to prevent a recurrence of a dengue fever outbreak. But some people in the Keys and elsewhere are up in arms, with more than 155,000 signing a petition opposing the trial of genetically engineered mosquitoes in a small area of 400 households next to Key West.

Many scientists say, however, that genetically modifying the Aedesmosquito — and possibly other types of mosquitoes carrying diseases such as malaria — is a more effective and environmentally benign way of controlling mosquito-borne illnesses than spraying pesticides and other measures. Oxitec’s genetically engineered Aedes aegypti has proven itself in other countries, successfully reducing populations of the insect by up to 90 percent in field trials in the Cayman Islands, Brazil, Malaysia, and Panama. Overall, the trials were so successful that Brazil approved the use of the GM mosquitoes last year. 

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