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Wolbachia could combat dengue fever

Humans could be protected from dengue fever by infecting the mosquitoes carrying it with a parasite which halves their lifespan. Australian scientists, writing in the journal Science, found that Wolbachia bacteria spread well through laboratory-bred mosquitoes. Only older mosquitoes pass on dengue - so killing them could cut disease. It remains to be seen how well the bacteria would spread outside the laboratory.

BBC NEWS

Humans could be protected from dengue fever by infecting the mosquitoes carrying it with a parasite which halves their lifespan. Australian scientists, writing in the journal Science, found that Wolbachia bacteria spread well through laboratory-bred mosquitoes. Only older mosquitoes pass on dengue – so killing them could cut disease. It remains to be seen how well the bacteria would spread outside the laboratory.

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This entry was posted on Friday, January 2nd, 2009 at 9:00 am and is filed under Bacteria, Biology, Emerging disease, Health, Medicine, Microbiology, Science, Virology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

One Comment

  • zayzayem says:
    January 5, 2009 at 5:54 am

    Could spreading wolbachia have effects on other insect species? Us Australians are a bit skeptical of biological controls since the cane toad.