What are the consequences of genetically altering ticks, fleas, and mosquitoes to control their populations?

[KLiKzg]

yeah true, from what I understand a phase 3 trial of a vaccine is just finishing in Finland

https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer-and-valneva-initiate-phase-3-study-lyme-disease#:~:text=The%20randomized%2C%20placebo%2Dcontrolled%2C,Sweden%20and%20the%20United%20States.

from the link:

The randomized, placebo-controlled, Phase 3 VALOR study is planned to enroll approximately 6,000 participants 5 years of age and older. The study is being conducted at up to 50 sites located in areas where Lyme disease is highly endemic, including Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Sweden and the United States.

and an updated article:

Valneva's Lyme disease vaccine candidate yields promising early results

The vaccine candidate was safe and produced a strong but waning immune response against the six most common strains of the Borrelia burgdorferi.

www.cidrap.umn.edu

although annual VLA15 boosters would be required to maintain protection against Lyme disease, the vaccine

so the vaccine works, but not a slam dunk as you will need a booster every year. damn that sucks, but if i lived in the NorthEast USA I would 100% be trying to get this vaccine.

lyme disease is different than other diseases ticks give though... so seems like you might need multiple shots...

I guess they would make it for dogs next...very soon & for yearly vaccinations.

 

[remixedcat]

I'd say leave em alone you never know if they can carrier to diseases that can wipe put the natural population causing the food chain disruptions!! It's allready happening!

 

[GodisanAtheist]

I'm sure the 600,000+ people that die every year from Malaria won't miss the mosquito.

Ultimately the goal of something like this will really be population control, anyone that has seen mosquito larva almost magically appear in any standing body of water without ever seeing or being bitten by an adult mosquito knows those things aren't going to get wiped out anytime soon.

 

[Space Lynx]

I'm sure the 600,000+ people that die every year from Malaria won't miss the mosquito.

Ultimately the goal of something like this will really be population control, anyone that has seen mosquito larva almost magically appear in any standing body of water without ever seeing or being bitten by an adult mosquito knows those things aren't going to get wiped out anytime soon.

I'm really surprised the number is that high still. Wild. I just read 96% of all malaria deaths occur in Africa, very interesting. I wonder if shifting climate patterns will make it so the malaria mosquito makes its to way to many other areas on Earth and that 600k number quadruples within the next decade or two (its easy to say the medicine will be there for those other countries, but with climate change will come catastrophe in industries and supply chains) I find it very strange the world came together on Covid and helped African countries get vaccines for covid and other diseases, but the rest of the world doesn't seem to come together to get malaria medicine to Africa in sufficient number, as the death rate seems pretty stable year over year. Humans make no sense to me.

 

[the54thvoid]

There's a lot of science and info on that here:

https://www.science.org/content/article/malaria-cases-could-ebb-even-hotter-world-other-diseases-will-get-worse

It's not as simple as shifting climates spreading malaria. There is evidence it goes both ways. As for why has the world not bothered with Africa? Apart from private individuals and charities, it's all about the investment and lack of return, as well as the fact it's not likely to be globally impacting. But billions have been spent over the years.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

I'm really surprised the number is that high still. Wild. I just read 96% of all malaria deaths occur in Africa, very interesting. I wonder if shifting climate patterns will make it so the malaria mosquito makes its to way to many other areas on Earth and that 600k number quadruples within the next decade or two (its easy to say the medicine will be there for those other countries, but with climate change will come catastrophe in industries and supply chains) I find it very strange the world came together on Covid and helped African countries get vaccines for covid and other diseases, but the rest of the world doesn't seem to come together to get malaria medicine to Africa in sufficient number, as the death rate seems pretty stable year over year. Humans make no sense to me.

Many effort shave been made to eliminate Malaria over the last 50 years; considering the WHO first attempted to wipe it out in the 1960s, it's ignorant to claim the world doesnt care. Hundreds of billions have been spent to try and wipe it out. I remember the drives we had to buy malaria nets for africa in school over 20 years ago.

The reality is that malaria is REALLY hard to eradicate. Not because of the parasite itself, it can only host in humans and can be treated with medication. The single largest issue with africa is......well, its africa. Huge portions of that continent still resemble life 300 years ago. Poverty is rampant. You need modern waste containment systems, road infrastructure, and medical facilities to both treat patients and limit the spread. In the west, we treat mosquitos. We have sprays, and chemicals, that limit their spread. We remove standing water so they cant breed, ece. Even then, we still have cases and deaths. Mostly carried from international travel, but not always. The argument goes that, if we modernize africa, much of this could be done. Of course, that hasnt worked out well, one can look at the collapse of countries like zimbabwe, the slow collapse of south africa, or the coup in Libya. All the positive emotions and construction wont help if war and destruction keep following.

This is why the genetic modification of mosquitos is being considered. The species that carry diseases like malaria and west nile are considered "pests", they are not a part of any major food chain for any other animal. The spread of genetically modified skeeters can be done without the constant follow up that malaria treatments require.

I'd say leave em alone you never know if they can carrier to diseases that can wipe put the natural population causing the food chain disruptions!! It's allready happening!

We DO know they carry diseases that can wipe out natural populations, thats why we want to get rid of them.

 

[Space Lynx]

Many effort shave been made to eliminate Malaria over the last 50 years; considering the WHO first attempted to wipe it out in the 1960s, it's ignorant to claim the world doesnt care. Hundreds of billions have been spent to try and wipe it out.

Africa to my knowledge gets plenty of HIV medication to cover everyone. I see no reason why malaria couldn't be included in that. The same logic applies, HIV medicine isn't profitable, but to my knowledge all of Africa, even the poorest of the poor can get it. I just went down the list of several Africa countries, and they all offer free HIV medication. Maleria can be cured with medicine. Big pharma is obviously helping/allowing these countries in Africa to make HIV medicine dirt cheap, so same could be done for maleria... I don't understand... maybe WHO is stupid? Cause they seem to have HIV medication supply chain figured out, if they can do it for one, why not the other...

 

[remixedcat]

Many effort shave been made to eliminate Malaria over the last 50 years; considering the WHO first attempted to wipe it out in the 1960s, it's ignorant to claim the world doesnt care. Hundreds of billions have been spent to try and wipe it out. I remember the drives we had to buy malaria nets for africa in school over 20 years ago.

The reality is that malaria is REALLY hard to eradicate. Not because of the parasite itself, it can only host in humans and can be treated with medication. The single largest issue with africa is......well, its africa. Huge portions of that continent still resemble life 300 years ago. Poverty is rampant. You need modern waste containment systems, road infrastructure, and medical facilities to both treat patients and limit the spread. In the west, we treat mosquitos. We have sprays, and chemicals, that limit their spread. We remove standing water so they cant breed, ece. Even then, we still have cases and deaths. Mostly carried from international travel, but not always. The argument goes that, if we modernize africa, much of this could be done. Of course, that hasnt worked out well, one can look at the collapse of countries like zimbabwe, the slow collapse of south africa, or the coup in Libya. All the positive emotions and construction wont help if war and destruction keep following.

This is why the genetic modification of mosquitos is being considered. The species that carry diseases like malaria and west nile are considered "pests", they are not a part of any major food chain for any other animal. The spread of genetically modified skeeters can be done without the constant follow up that malaria treatments require.


We DO know they carry diseases that can wipe out natural populations, thats why we want to get rid of them.

genetically altered bees can possibly kill off native bees...

 

[Aquinus]

There's a lot of science and info on that here:

https://www.science.org/content/article/malaria-cases-could-ebb-even-hotter-world-other-diseases-will-get-worse

It's not as simple as shifting climates spreading malaria. There is evidence it goes both ways. As for why has the world not bothered with Africa? Apart from private individuals and charities, it's all about the investment and lack of return, as well as the fact it's not likely to be globally impacting. But billions have been spent over the years.

Why invest in Africa when you have Americans with private insurance who can be convinced to pay $1,000 for a single monthly dose of a medication? The sad reality is that Africa isn't where the money is at, unless you start talking about natural resources and rare earth metals, in which case the world is more than happy to exploit them. Places like the DRC might not realize it, but their natural resources are a huge point of leverage that they're not taking advantage of. It's a pity that they fight amongst themselves so often and also tend to fall into corruption.

Africa to my knowledge gets plenty of HIV medication to cover everyone. I see no reason why malaria couldn't be included in that. The same logic applies, HIV medicine isn't profitable, but to my knowledge all of Africa, even the poorest of the poor can get it. I just went down the list of several Africa countries, and they all offer free HIV medication. Maleria can be cured with medicine. Big pharma is obviously helping/allowing these countries in Africa to make HIV medicine dirt cheap, so same could be done for maleria... I don't understand... maybe WHO is stupid? Cause they seem to have HIV medication supply chain figured out, if they can do it for one, why not the other...

Cost. HIV medication became cheap when it became a western problem and produced at scale. A valid argument can be made that Europe and North America and Australia don't have to deal with it (malaria,) so the resources haven't been invested in ramping up production and improving cost like it had been with HIV/AIDS.

 

[ExcuseMeWtf]

We were actually quite close to eradicating malaria by using DDT, but it was banned due to concerns over environmental effects.

This is a difficult subject, because there is no clear-cut solution there, only tradeoffs:

DDT and Malaria Prevention: Addressing the Paradox

The debate regarding dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) in malaria prevention and human health is polarized and can be classified into three positions: anti-DDT, centrist-DDT, pro-DDT.We attempted to arrive at a synthesis by matching a series of questions ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[DavidC1]

It's absolutely a crazy idea to mess with something so fundamental.

Analyzing the Japanese Apple farmer that managed to get his Apple trees to grow successfully without pesticides or herbicides shows that they ALL play a part. Most fruit trees are extremely sensitive to conditions of the soil and will not even flower, nevermind fruit until it is good and then the roots will become larger.

With bad quality soil,

The "pests" come such as mosquitoes and other insects, and weeds grow. Most so-called weeds are very resilient to adverse conditions so they grow in soil that farmers would call useless. By offering shade over the ground away from Sun's heat and UV rays, it starts to get moist and creates bacteria. The interaction among countless bacteria, worms, insects, plants, and animals is what eventually creates a healthy ecosystem.

Essentially insects such as mosquitoes and flies are responsible for cleaning up the environment, and establishing a base for other animals to come in.

One guy who knows about this jokingly calls mosquitoes a defense against humans that come to mess up the land. While weeding and flipping the contents of the soil upside down as done in modern mass farming practices helps in the short term and maximize yield, long term it degrades the soil exactly because the Sun comes in and kills all the unseen ecosystem(bacteria). Then herbicide and pesticides start becoming mandatory. I'm pretty sure any genetic modifications will bring even worse pests to clean up the mess immoral scientists have made.

You are essentially babying the plants you are trying to grow, so eventually like babies they become susceptible to any bit of adverse conditions and become weak and frail.

 

[Space Lynx]

It's absolutely a crazy idea to mess with something so fundamental.

That's partially why I made this thread, because they are already doing it with genetically modified mosquitoes. So it presents an interesting moral dilemma, I thought it would be neat to discuss. It has been so far.

 

[DavidC1]

That's partially why I made this thread, because they are already doing it with genetically modified mosquitoes. So it presents an interesting moral dilemma, I thought it would be neat to discuss. It has been so far.

Most scientists doing this must either believe a) Nature is fixed b) They have no morals.

Chernobyl has mushrooms that hasn't been seen in any other place in the world. They live off of radiation. So again they act as cleaners that pave the way for more complex organisms that isn't as resilient.

Gene modification will likely result in further mutation resulting in unknown, more "bothersome" pests to clean up after irresponsible humans again. Even us humans are adaptable immediately(behavior-wise), short-term(like adapting to different weather), and likely long term(multiple generations).

 

[Lew Zealand]

Most scientists doing this must either believe a) Nature is fixed b) They have no morals.

c) Neither of these. How did you come up with that opinion?

Chernobyl has mushrooms that hasn't been seen in any other place in the world. They live off of radiation. So again they act as cleaners that pave the way for more complex organisms that isn't as resilient.

They may tolerate radiation well, which some organisms do better than others. Radiosynthesis is only a claim and not well supported by experimental data. They still obtain nourishment from typical sources in the soil. Details are important and again they're missing from your claims.

Gene modification will likely result in further mutation resulting in unknown, more "bothersome" pests to clean up after irresponsible humans again. Even us humans are adaptable immediately(behavior-wise), short-term(like adapting to different weather), and likely long term(multiple generations).

How will they "likely result" in further mutation? This demonstrates a lack of understanding of how gene modification works, similar to the claim above it.

 

[R-T-B]

mosquitoes

Are literally blood-sucking parasites, and as such, a pretty major vector for bloodborne disease. They are certainly not "cleaning up" jack shit.

immoral scientists

Scientists have ethics too, you know.

Chernobyl has mushrooms that hasn't been seen in any other place in the world.

Not only are they also in other places in the world, but they weren't even ever claimed to only be discovered at Chernobyl:

Radiotrophic fungus - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

c) Neither of these. How did you come up with that opinion?

Yeah, that is quite the bold claim he's making. How about: Nature isn't perfect? It's more chaos in action and without guidance, couldn't give two shits about us?

 

[Space Lynx]

I watched this recently, how they control the fruit fly with radiation to damage reproduction similar to mosquitoes without the genetic editing, interesting. It seems to solve their problems anyway.

 

[Space Lynx]

mosquitoes are early this year, a couple got into our house. usually they don't show up until late June/early July for my area. NEVER seen them this early. it's fucking hell already. they are everywhere. wtf.

I have changed my opinion, I hope they get eradicated, and we move to a model of feeding the birds more bird seed. fuck this, already bit and its barely out of April.

ITCH ITCH ITCH FUCKING FUCK

little demon fucks

 

[remixedcat]

mosquitoes are early this year, a couple got into our house. usually they don't show up until late June/early July for my area. NEVER seen them this early. it's fucking hell already. they are everywhere. wtf.

I have changed my opinion, I hope they get eradicated, and we move to a model of feeding the birds more bird seed. fuck this, already bit and its barely out of April.

ITCH ITCH ITCH FUCKING FUCK

little demon fucks

We need more bats!! Plus bats are cute!!

 

[Dr. Dro]

mosquitoes are early this year, a couple got into our house. usually they don't show up until late June/early July for my area. NEVER seen them this early. it's fucking hell already. they are everywhere. wtf.

I have changed my opinion, I hope they get eradicated, and we move to a model of feeding the birds more bird seed. fuck this, already bit and its barely out of April.

ITCH ITCH ITCH FUCKING FUCK

little demon fucks

Hey at least be glad it doesn't trigger a full blown allergic reaction on you like it does to me. And do I have mosquitoes here! We even have a dengue epidemic going on right now. I actually have repellents and a small flask of dexchlorpheniramine (this drug was sent from the heavens as it both stops my itching and rashes, but can also cure my insomnia...) handy...

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

That's partially why I made this thread, because they are already doing it with genetically modified mosquitoes. So it presents an interesting moral dilemma, I thought it would be neat to discuss. It has been so far.

So....I'm missing a step here. The mosquitos that are released regularly are not really genetically modified. They've called it that...but once you tear down into the actual goal it's taking a population of a specific species, selected to be non-biting, and the "modification" is to have only male offspring. This means that instead of eliminating the population your goal is to apply selective pressure to minimize the population of females on an invasive species...

The "morality" of such is minor, as you're basically taking an existing version of the invasive animal and applying a selective pressure to breed more males than females...decreasing but not eliminating a population you don't want. The problem is that this is super expensive, it doesn't address all pests...and more frustratingly the mathematical models are only accurate if your tweak sticks....given adaptation and random mutations in populations of billions are quite frequent.



Regarding the pest insects as a whole...I'm down with the same technique. Not elimination, because that's stupid. I'm down with dramatically decreasing the viable reproducing population. You're welcome to consider whether that's a moral conundrum or not...but I see it as a thing that already happens. The problem is that nature will find a way around this if used regularly, as can already be demonstrated: Tree Hugger article on sex changing animals
I'm more concerned that if pests demonstrate the ability to do this we'll discover a new kind of dilema. The amount of invasive species is already huge...and grows every year with our international world. Think Citrus Greening, and I'll gladly take a solution that kills 100% of an invasive species (CA invasive species list)...just as long as nobody gets the brilliant idea to mix the definition of pest and invasive.

 

[Endymio]

So....I'm missing a step here. The mosquitos that are released regularly are not really genetically modified.

Eh? Of course they are. CRISPR gene-editing technology is used on them. Of course, Mother Nature "genetically modifies" mosquitos on a daily basis ... that's how the process of evolution functions.

The amount of invasive species is already huge...and grows every year with our international world.

So? Every species on earth was once an "invasive" species -- Europe feeds itself with wheat, corn, potatoes -- all imported from elsewhere in the world. Drawing an arbitrary line in history and claiming that plants and animals which arrived before this time are "good" and all others "bad" is rather ridiculous. It's particular absurd in places like the Hawaiian Islands, where animals who hitched a ride there on wooden canoes are stringently protected by law, while those who arrived a few hundred years later on wooden sailing ships are fervented attempted to be exterminated as "undesirable".

 

[Space Lynx]

I chatted with AI about this thread, and it said the consequences of genetically modifying living things remain to be seen, and it got very existential on me, was pretty wild chat. lol

 

[lilhasselhoffer]

Eh? Of course they are. CRISPR gene-editing technology is used on them. Of course, Mother Nature "genetically modifies" mosquitos on a daily basis ... that's how the process of evolution functions.


So? Every species on earth was once an "invasive" species -- Europe feeds itself with wheat, corn, potatoes -- all imported from elsewhere in the world. Drawing an arbitrary line in history and claiming that plants and animals which arrived before this time are "good" and all others "bad" is rather ridiculous. It's particular absurd in places like the Hawaiian Islands, where animals who hitched a ride there on wooden canoes are stringently protected by law, while those who arrived a few hundred years later on wooden sailing ships are fervented attempted to be exterminated as "undesirable".

You...I cannot tell if you are being intentionally obtuse or just don't get that there's a difference.

Let me short this one for you...in multiple ways. The "genetic modification" you are talking about on the mosquitos is not a modification. It's basically the results of identifying existing genes, and making sure that they are selected for. They aren't adding anything new, or fundamentally changing DNA with CRISPR. They are selecting for specific existing genes. As such, this is about as "genetic engineering" as selecting for a child with brown eyes instead of blue eyes. That's a huge distinction about the morality here....because introducing a man-made kill switch gene is extremely unpalatable.


To your second comment...I can only believe that you are extremely ignorant. I'll hope that this ignorance is the source of such malice. If not, then you can basically pretend that your perfect world has no bio-diversity and only tolerates a single species in a single niche. Let me short this:
1) Fleas on rats caused the black death. It's animals demonstrating that through human relocation they can breed in new ecosystems they otherwise wouldn't be able to get to. Imagine the obvious difficulty of a rat swimming across the Atlantic...because sometimes the reason things don't evolve is because they cannot without intervantion.
2) Insects are right now murdering oranges. Citrus greening is a thing. As this is a bacteria introduced by an insect it's fine..
3) The "banana" flavor of things is wrong because we created a mono-culture of bananas that didn't like it when a single fungus was introduced and ravaged the system. It was and therefore should be our imperative too...what? Kill the fungus, or the banana?
4) I'm sure every single Aussie would be happy if Cane toads were extinct...and I'd agree as an invasive species that is decimating the biosphere. That said, if your solution was to kill all of them in Australia and then in South America/North America we'd have an issue....but you seem to be fine with this?

I'll end on a grim note. Unless you're stating all of this from Africa then you are suggesting the most invasive species, homo sapiens, should likewise be killed because it's immaterial about when our invasive progress was made. That's the unpleasant truth of what I'm suggesting while sitting in North America...and you take it a step further by pretending that invasive or not we should get to control our environment. Funny how when you take it to that logical end both of our points are basically closer to Bender in Futurama than stewards of the planet. Just a little food for thought, because I have to accept my hypocrisy lies in thinking humans have any right to decide.

 

[Endymio]

Let me short this one for you.....The "genetic modification" you are talking about on the mosquitos is not a modification. It's basically the results of identifying existing genes, and making sure that they are selected for. They aren't adding anything new, or fundamentally changing DNA with CRISPR

LOL, what? Learn about the subject, please. You think mosquitos naturally carry an "existing gene" that makes them fluorescent? Or require doses of antibiotics to stay alive?

"Oxitec mosquitoes carry a fluorescent marker gene that makes them glow when exposed to a specific colour of light, which makes identification easier."

...At Oxitec’s laboratory in the U.K., the company genetically engineers the mosquitoes, giving the insects the “self-limiting” gene that makes the females dependent on the antibiotic tetracycline. Without the drug, they will die....."

1) Fleas on rats caused the black death.

Yes, which is a very good reason to eliminate fleas. The idea that the "more biodiversity the better" is childishly absurd. Some species are good for mankind; some are not.

I'm sure every single Aussie would be happy if Cane toads were extinct

Cool, the standard textbook example every sixth-grader is taught. For every "invasive" species that annoys people there are 100+ "native" species as bad or worse. And 18 of Australia's top food crops are "invasive" species -- would "every Aussie" be happy without wheat, corn, oats, cotton, beef, and chicken?

Insects are right now murdering oranges.

This actually made me laugh out loud: a near-perfect quote from a comedy of a man's horrible blind date with a whacko environmentalist, shrieking about oranges being murdered.

 

[Space Lynx]

I mostly agree with you, humans as a species brought a lot of imbalance to the insect world, and we should at least attempt to regain that balance.

Ladybugs eat fleas, but there simply aren't enough ladybugs to have any meaningful impact on the population of fleas, their diet is very vast though, so if we eliminated fleas, all of them, which I think is impossible, but if somehow we did, I think ladybugs would still be fine as they have a decent amount of options.