r/technology • u/lurker_bee • 23h ago

Biotechnology Burkina Faso says no to Bill Gates’ plan of creating modified species of mosquitoes

https://africa.businessinsider.com/local/lifestyle/burkina-faso-says-no-to-bill-gates-plan-of-creating-modified-species-of-mosquitoes/xyk7xm8
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u/SteelMarch 22h ago

Except it had nothing to do with that and concerns about how it could impact their ecosystem and environment.

Countries tend to not like being testing sites for new and experimental things.

Concerning the program, ethical debates loom large. Some argue that targeting a species, even one as harmful as the malaria mosquito, for extinction raises profound ecological and moral questions.

“This technology is highly controversial and poses ethical challenges. We are saying that we should prioritize safe alternatives,” said Ali Tapsoba, spokesperson for a coalition against the project.

"This technology is highly controversial, unpredictable, and raises ethical concerns. More specifically, the impacts of gene-drive organisms on health and ecosystems remain unknown and potentially irreversible."

"Critics further highlighted that the modified mosquito strains originated in laboratories in Europe, raising questions of scientific neo-colonialism and external influence."

Much much more complicated.

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u/iwaterboardheathens 22h ago

Except it's not testing and they've been doing this for decades

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u/MerleLikesMullets 22h ago

Gene modified mosquitos are new. Groups have been releasing non gene edited sterile mosquitos in small quantities for research for decades but we use pesticides.

In Sarasota County, Florida, where seven of the eight locally acquired cases were identified this summer, containing malaria is still a matter of targeting the mosquitoes, both as adults and in the larval stage. Mosquito control teams say they have sprayed more than 470 miles with pesticides targeted at adult mosquitoes using trucks at night and have targeted swamps and canals with so-called larvicides to stop them earlier in their life cycle.

cnn

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u/jmizzle 22h ago

And that spray causes massive collateral damage to other species of insects that fly at night.

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u/spookymulderfbi 20h ago

Plus genetically modified mosquitoes replace the undesirable mosquitoes, keeping predators that eat them from going through a food shortage. They still have food, and it's not full of poison.

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u/Abedeus 20h ago

Are the mosquitos even that much of a "food source" for predators? Last I checked they don't make up that much biomass that their extinction would be noticeable.

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u/spookymulderfbi 19h ago

I'm definitely not an expert but from the articles I've read, I thought that was one of the main reasons that bioengineering less infectious or non infectious replacements was safer than outright elimination. E.g. even if it was 5% of an animal's food source, eliminating it without ensuring there is another source to replace that 5% could cause incremental changes in the food web etc. and we can't reliably predict the outcomes all the way up and down the food chain.

As a layman, that does seem to make more logical sense to me, but I wouldn't be surprised if I'm missing something.

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u/Serplantprotector 16h ago

Mosquitoes are actually an important pollinator insect for swamps and wetland areas where there are fewer other pollinator species. It's only a short period of time where the females seek out blood needed for fertilisation.

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u/ParaponeraBread 12h ago

How many times have we removed something from a food web and had it go well? Besides, there are way more mosquito species than there are species that carry disease.

It’s never just a biomass calculation. Certain birds eat a lot of mosquitoes, bats eat a lot of mosquitoes. Fish eat a ton of mosquito larvae. You’d potentially be fumbling the bag for a bunch of other species and those knock on effects are extremely hard to predict.

It’s so much better and less risky to modify the disease out of the ones that we have than to fuck with the whole ecology of a region.

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u/petit_cochon 10h ago

Mosquitoes are a huge food source for insectivores, which are themselves a huge food source for larger predators.

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u/Evening_Echidna_7493 15h ago

They thrive around urban and suburban areas, unlike a lot of insects. Their larvae are important food for aquatic species and water filter feeders, and the adults are pollinators and food for thousands of species. They’re a very important food source in a time where insect populations are plummeting rapidly. IMO, it would be better to target and eliminate the diseases they spread (which is possible, at least for some of the diseases) rather than the mosquito.

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u/Neve4ever 16h ago

The genetically modified mosquitoes in this particular plan are meant to interbreed with the "undesirable mosquitoes", and to pass on a genetic mutation that lowers fertility rates so that the species collapses. They aren't replaced.

Of course, that type of evolutionary pressure could lead to us seeing some weird shit when the "fittest" survive. And if it ends up crossing to "desirable mosquitoes" then we could end up seeing the collapse of all mosquitoes.

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u/spookymulderfbi 14h ago

Agreed, that's a good clarification, the genetically modified mosquitoes just breed with existing mosquitoes, and the mutated offspring would be the replenishment / replacement generation.

Also agreed that all angles need to be considered, such as your example of them breeding outside their intended population, which could end up giving rise to other unintended mutations in other species, etc. It's definitely wild.

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u/Expert-Diver7144 20h ago

Yes 10 years and they still have a huge problem.

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u/akie 17h ago

Peak Reddit - confident yet wrong. My partner did her PhD on mosquitos and diseases, and has extremely strong opinions on the “tech bro” (my words) approach that Gates and co have on this topic. They’re well-intentioned but wrong, and gloss over well-established truths in the field, they ignore human factors, and they’re typically ok with using whole countries as their personal experimental playground in the name of science and disease eradication. Super not ok and wrong headed.

For example, did you ever hear about the multi-decade extremely well-funded mosquito eradication program in Brazil in the fifties? Here’s a quote:

In 1958, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) officially declared that Brazil had successfully eradicated the mosquito Aedes aegypti, responsible for the transmission of yellow fever, dengue fever, chikungunya, and recently Zika virus.1 In early 2016, the Brazilian minister of health, Marcelo Castro, described the situation of dengue fever as “catastrophic.” He explained that “2015 was the year of the greatest number of cases of dengue in the history of Brazil.”2 Discussing the epidemic of Zika virus, which amplified the crisis produced by the persistence of dengue fever, Brazil’s president, Dilma Russeff, declared in January 2016 that “we are in the process of losing the war against the mosquito Aedes aegypti.”3 Such pessimistic statements—followed by affirmations that the current severe setbacks can be overcome—contrast dramatically with the optimism of the 1960s. In 1964, Fred Lowe Soper, who directed the Pan American Sanitary Organization between 1947 and 1959, claimed that there could be no doubt about the success of the continent-wide campaign to eradicate the Aedes mosquito.4 The impressive progress toward the eradication of Aedes in Latin America gave hope that its eradication in Asia was feasible as well.

(source)

Life, umm, finds a way.

Mosquitoes in particular are EXTREMELY resilient and adapt insanely fast.

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u/SteelMarch 22h ago

Except this is new and not tested on scale. CRISPR and gene testing is not done in the US like this at all.

You must be thinking of other things we do such as killing screworms. Which would be invasive and not native. Please stop saying things you don't understand.

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u/SnackyMcGeeeeeeeee 22h ago

Literally done in the Americans south consistently

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u/Comprehensive_Web862 21h ago

You both are right to an extent actually they are using a modified yeast that fucks with the mosquitos Rna. They are an insect growth regulator (hormones) so one of the safest. The issue with this not working in Africa is that the product isn't shelf stable and needs to be refrigerated before use.

Crispr itself is a Pandora's box situation where once you introduce something into the genepool than it's in the gene pool functionally forever.

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u/SteelMarch 22h ago

No, it's not. That's different.

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u/SnackyMcGeeeeeeeee 22h ago

I'll take your word on it bud

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u/Ok_Tone6393 22h ago

thank you for your detailed and eloquent answer

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u/therhubarbman 22h ago

Brain dead reply. You got nothin. Put up or shut up.

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u/CorruptedFlame 22h ago

You... don't know what you're talking about? This is literally done in America for decades now lol. It works.

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u/yoshiary 22h ago

You don't know what you're talking about. The US only started doing releases of genetically modified mosquitos (with crisper) in 2021. The consequences of these modifications on an ecosystem still need to be studied. In fact, there's a lack of regulation on this subject in the US. Burkina Faso should not be tut tutted for exercising it's sovereignty and not reigning to the whims of one of the richest men in the world. They can adopt the technology if and when it's proven to not be devastating to the local ecosystem.

What a lot of people who stan Bill Gates don't know about is that it might be possible for gene drives to JUMP species. Imagine what that means when you release gene drives with the intent of reducing a population...

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u/leo-g 22h ago

Singapore been doing successfully since 2016.

https://www.nea.gov.sg/corporate-functions/resources/research/environmental_health_institute/wolbachia-aedes-mosquito-suppression-strategy

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u/-spicychilli- 21h ago

What I've learned from this thread is that some people genuinely do not want to be helped.

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u/Abedeus 19h ago

Also, lots of antiscientific people are super confident about scientific topics.

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u/workshop_prompts 22h ago

Where have gene drive mosquitoes been released in the US? Modified yes, but iirc not gene drive.

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u/monty228 22h ago

Hawaii just this year released them to help protect birds from disease.

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u/Spartan_162 21h ago

I saw the article you mentioned. They also mentioned that Hawaii is a unique case in that the mosquitos were invasive species. Experts still remain cautious against introducing such mosquitos into places where mosquitos are native to because we don’t know the effects it’s going to bring to the ecosystem

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u/monty228 20h ago

I know research was done for Australia to determine if knocking out mosquitos would cause a reaction to the ecosystem. They found no issue before releasing a mosquito STD.

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u/Spartan_162 19h ago

But what works for the Australian ecosystem doesn’t translate to other countries or regions. I’d say there needs to be sufficient research about the ecosystem conducted before deploying gene edited mosquitoes. Hawaii is different in that the mosquitoes are invasive so removing them are beneficial

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u/Abedeus 19h ago

Talk about moving goalposts...

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u/monty228 19h ago

Is a species truly invasive if it has been on every continent (except Antarctica) for 20 million years?

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u/workshop_prompts 21h ago

That was utilizing Wolbachia, not gene drive.

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u/AnsibleAnswers 22h ago

Never mind the fact that we’re changing ecosystems so much that it’s hard to even measure the impacts of this particular intervention in the US. Bat, bird, and insect populations aren’t exactly doing well in the US.

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u/d4561wedg 22h ago

Well I wouldn’t consider America as having a particularly healthy environment.

Talk to forestry people in America, a lot of American forests are a mess of invasive species and unstable populations. People just think they look healthy because they’re still green and no one alive today knows what a pristine American forest looks like.

Then you get to the Great Plains where almost the entire prairie has been destroyed and converted to farmland. Remember the dust bowl? One of the largest man made environmental disasters ever? It never stopped by the way, people have just been constantly irrigating the fields ever since. If the water ever runs out America is screwed.

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u/trisul-108 22h ago

The alternatives they are using are so much worse. Everything is being sprayed with insecticide which also harm other insects, animals and humans. The arguments you quote have no real substance, they are just excuses because someone decided to stop this project.

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u/mecheterp96 22h ago

Better to let hundreds of thousands die of malaria, right?

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u/thevernabean 22h ago

Don't forget the mega doses of insecticides to the surrounding countryside!

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u/Icedcoffeeee 19h ago

“This technology is highly controversial and poses ethical challenges. We are saying that we should prioritize safe alternatives,” said Ali Tapsoba, spokesperson for a coalition against the project.

If the "alternatives" were effective, this conversation wouldn't be happening.

Malaria cases would be zero or close to zero.

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u/Slusny_Cizinec 20h ago

Oh noes, in Europe! 

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u/Vanaquish231 16h ago

We are talking about mosquitos here. You could nuke an area full of mosquitos and you would still have a fuck ton around.

Besides it's not exactly new. They have done something similar to some flesh eating flies in central America. I think Panama?

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u/petit_cochon 10h ago

They have released sterile mosquitoes in America.

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u/Wealist 22h ago

Burkina Faso’s pushback isn’t just about malaria it’s ecological risk, irreversibility and distrust of being used as a lab for Western tech

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u/Poopyman80 22h ago

The US has been doing it since like the 1950's
This is not a test, its proven tech.

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u/BarfingOnMyFace 22h ago

Last few paragraphs are just fear mongering.

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u/d4561wedg 22h ago

Those do sound like pretty good points.

While I’m not familiar with this specific case I am familiar with many cases of people trying to modify ecosystems by adding or removing specific species and it rarely ever goes well.

If a malaria vaccine is available then that would a preferable solution and if not one should be developed.

I understand not wanting your environment messed with for a rich guy’s test when proven human side interventions exist that do not have unpredictable effects on the local ecology.

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u/jab305 22h ago

It's not some rich guys test, he's trying to save millions of lives. I'm sure he's thought about developing vaccines too...

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u/d4561wedg 22h ago

Bill Gates is not a charitable person. He’s a billionaire. They’re all evil.

Remember when he stopped a COVID vaccine from going open source so he could make more money by privatizing it? He’s fought against waiving patent protections for COVID vaccines in general.

How many people do you think died because of that?

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u/DigNitty 22h ago edited 21h ago

For me it’s the profound ethical question of “should humans be capable of choosing to end an entire species.”

And is this the end? A one and done? We’ll never do this to another species right? Or another sub species, parasite, harmful human genetic trait…

edit: Yes, these are exactly the people who shouldn't be in charge of the decision making.

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u/hungry2know 22h ago

Humans have caused many species to go extinct, mosquitos wouldn't be close to the first or last

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u/bICEmeister 22h ago

Should we be capable to do this? That's not up for debate - we already very much are. It's a question of how we choose to wield that capability.

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u/xper0072 22h ago

So you use no medicines like antibiotics or anything like that, right? The assumption that this would eradicate mosquitoes isn't founded, but even if it was, we already seek to eradicate things that are harmful to humanity provided their eradication doesn't harm us further.

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u/TapTapTapTapTapTaps 22h ago

Literally “do you eat.” Stop all food that was created from genetic testing and you basically have millions dying from food shortage.

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u/Solomonsk5 22h ago

If we want to become a tier 1 species we're going to eliminate a few species along the way. At least this would be on purpose. 

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u/HugoRBMarques 22h ago

Your last quoted paragraph is completely nonsensical.