17. Reduction In Dengue Fever
What It Can Do: Reduces Dengue Fever
Discovered By: World Mosquito Program
Est. Cost: Unknown*
Mosquitos have, for millennia, been a nuisance to humanity, as well as a mode of transportation for a variety of tropical, and subtropical, diseases – infecting close to 50 million people a year with Dengue Fever alone. A few years ago, the World Mosquito Program finally had enough, and came up with a plan to give mosquitos a taste of their own medicine by infecting them with the Wolbachia bacterium.
Reduction In Dengue Fever ©Kwangmoozaa / Shutterstock.com
Although the bacterium is harmless to the mosquitos, the trial, which was done over a 27-month period in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, showed a 77% decrease in the number of people infected with the disease. Another promising sign of the study showed that the Wolbachia is also transmissible through the mosquitos’ eggs and into their larvae.