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/irascible_Clown 21h ago

My ex did two years in the peace corps in Burkina Faso. From the conversations we had when she was there I can assure you that they need the mosquito problem fixed asap.

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u/Zetice 20h ago

Everyone is troare lap dog. In reality he has not accomplished a single thing since seizing power. Just another military ran country until someone else seizes power from him.

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u/irascible_Clown 20h ago

She was there during Blaise Compaoré reign back in 2011 and it seems like they have made no progress since then.

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u/Kryptonicus 18h ago

Don't be so quick to say no progress. There has been two successful coups and two unsuccessful coup attempts since 2011!

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u/SimmentalTheCow 6h ago

Six more and they get a free Slushie!

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u/ReammyA55 6h ago

Thomas Sankara was the only one doing things for Burkina Faso and its people. Trying to make it independent from any outside intervention and autonomous. See what that got him. The ones who pushed and helped to get him killed put up Compaoré and that's that. Puppet state for outside interests.

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u/Sad_Equipment_3022 16h ago

Those stories of roads etc being built are false? I can never tell 

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u/Invinciblez_Gunner 19h ago

He ended French Colonial control, thats a great achievment

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u/Some-Concentrate3229 18h ago

They’ve been independent since 1960.

What they ended with France was a military agreement that was greatly effective at controlling Islamic terrorism in the region. If that’s a great achievement, I think we have differing definitions.

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u/Invinciblez_Gunner 18h ago

France controls their currency

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u/Some-Concentrate3229 18h ago edited 18h ago

The West African Franc? You’re telling me that France controls the Central Bank of West African States? Are you being serious or are you just fucking with me?

They print the F.CFA in France, that’s it. Unless you have some evidence saying otherwise? But you don’t, or else you would’ve shared it.

e: I see what he’s (probably) talking about. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/how-the-france-backed-african-cfa-franc-works-as-an-enabler-and-barrier-to-development/

France says that they guarantee the convertibility of CFA to Euro if the members of the Central Bank of African States keep 50% of their foreign currency in the French treasury. I can see how this can be viewed as France trying to “control their currency”. With that being said, that would be a really shortsighted takeaway of it. It’s been a policy for many decades, going back to when Africa as a whole was significantly less stable than it is nowadays. Having that guarantee of convertibility made foreign investors more comfortable, and contributed to double-digit increases in GDP for a few countries.

If in the modern day they feel ready to take more control of their currency and don’t want the guarantee of convertibility, they can just take their foreign currency back.

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u/Super_Swim_8540 17h ago

The French economy is based on the economic exploitation of Africa. This is why France killed Thomas Sankara, who tried to restore Burkina Faso's total economic sovereignty. He wanted to break with external dependence, imperialism and corruption, which are the three main reasons for the poor economic and social performance of sub-Saharan African countries.

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u/EstablishmentLow2312 16h ago

Why bother with westerners they barely understand culture much less geopolitics,  school teach pc version of history

France also controlled a few important assets (water) and got cheap uranium and russia exposed them 

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u/Quasar375 6h ago

Hey, tell me, French economy is supposed to colapse without african resources, right? Now that the french oppressor is out, surely they will crumble... in how much time?

You know, they need uranium... that they already bought mostly from khazakstan, they need gold... that they already have in reserves... what else?

Oh and please tell me, how is everything going over there with your new russian allies??

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u/Super_Swim_8540 14h ago

Yes, that's why France seeks to maintain corrupt governments in Africa to maintain control over their economies in order to extract mass value and compensate for all the corruption they allow in their own countries, which allows them to remain in power and maintain their privileges (Mitterand, Macron, Sarkozy, etc.).

And otherwise, they try to subjugate them. When that doesn't work, they corrupt their entourage, their media, and have them assassinated, pretending that these are independent autonomous revolts without hidden Western funding.

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u/Some-Concentrate3229 13h ago

The only people who will be negatively affected by Africa working with Russia and China are Africans. I don’t give a shit what they do. They’ll just have to lie in the hole they’ve dug.

I’m gonna continue not caring about the entire continent minus literally 4 countries.

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u/Moifaso 16h ago

 I can see how this can be viewed as France trying to “control their currency”.

I can't. France controls neither the Euro nor the conversion rate. So no, they don't control the currency.

Holding some of the foreign reserves in France was an old measure put in place to secure the currency agaisnt palace coups and instability in the region. Said reserves (as well as currency administration) are in the process of being moved fully to African control.

https://www.senenews.com/actualites/economie/lafrique-en-quete-de-souverainete-la-fin-du-franc-cfa-et-les-defis-de-la-monnaie-ecom_527202.html

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u/Mithras666 1h ago

Are you being purposely dense? France controlling African economies doesn't require them to have control over the Euro too lmao, are you serious?

You say they have gold in their reserves, how do you think it got there?

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u/pangolinparty999 11h ago

The French are very proud and have enacted laws that limit the practice of Islam in France to maintain their historical culture. That’s the primary fuel for a lot of the Saharan cells. It’s reasonable to argue that removing France from the country would prioritize saving the lives of the Burkinabe people from internal terrorist attacks, opposed to prioritizing combatting terrorism in France which is what the French troops were there to do.

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u/Quasar375 6h ago

Wow, so many wrong things here. First of all, France has enacted laws that limit the practice of RELIGION in France to maintain civil order. For example, no religious indumentary inside government buildings. Christians are totally okay with this. Only some Muslims are not okay with this because they value what their religion says more than what their countries law says. See the problem?

And also, terrorist cells in the Sahel terrorize primarily the people pf Burkhina Faso, Mali, etc. France is much less affected by them and yet they were helping.

France was removed by Traore and guess what? Terrorists advanced and killed even more people because Burkhina Fasos and Russian mercenaries are not good enough at fighting, while terrorists love taking over the country

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u/Zetice 17h ago

And what did that “control” include exactly?

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u/pangolinparty999 11h ago

Exactly. Intel sharing, monetary requirements, resource “deals”, etc.

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u/Robo-boogie 7h ago

Malaria is no joke.

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u/jeffsaidjess 6h ago

Yeah fuck bill gates though.

He was ruthless and crushed everyone in Silicon Valley. The government had to break up his monopoly.

He didn’t magically change and become an altruistic genius.

You never watched his deposition did you.

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u/Sea-Traffic4481 5h ago

My ex-wife worked for a company that made some snake oil kind of medical equipment. Sort of a general wellness thing that allegedly could measure and predict various problems based on the heat radiating from the patient fingertip...

So, they tried to peddle their junk to all sorts of places, and one "interested" party was in Burkina Faso. She being a doctor, tried to, against company interests, convince the guy who was trying to negotiate the deal that they'd be better off spending the little funds they have on cleaning water infrastructure, or even paving roads to the hospital, which could ensure the ambulances don't get stuck delivering the patients to ER.

But their problem is they don't have enough funds to address the real issues. So they just waste money on a tech project, often from private sector to say they've accomplished something. And then they also steal most of that money anyways. Like, the uncle of the guy who my ex talked to was some sort of a tribal leader. And he grifted enough money so that he bought a... drum roll... collection of socks of Michael Jackson. That's where he chose to put his money in.

Also, some other relative of that procurement guy, who was another tribal leader, got killed, when people he was the leader of figured that the grift went too far.

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u/rolandyonaba 32m ago

Yes, we definitely need to eradicate malaria, and similar mosquito-transmitted diseases. Not only Burkina Faso, but most sub-saharian African countries. Yet, the core question remains.... Are these loudly-funded programs - such as TargetMalaria - really here to help ? Past evidence has shown that .... not, really.

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u/Danger_Danger 18h ago

Bill Gates is not a good person, and he isn't interested in helping people as much as he is interested in enslaving governments through manipulating data.

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u/scarletphantom 15h ago

Bill Gates has helped people way more than most billionaires. Is he perfect? No. You don't get that rich without some skeletons, but he genuinely has done a lot more good than harm.

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u/Treewithatea 17h ago

Humans interacting with nature in a positive way is not uncommon. Nature can be just as cruel and capable of completely destroying perfectly balanced ecosystems without human intervention and theres been many many situations in which humans combat unhealthy developments in nature to protect diversified and balanced ecosystems.

I dont think Bill Gates has any ill will here. He sees a nation struggling with this issue and an incompetent government that doesnt know how to deal with it.

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u/Danger_Danger 16h ago

I don't disagree about working nature to fight things that are harmful for humans, making resistant crops or new medicines and that. Genetically modifying mosquitos in some way so as to remove them as a vector, etc. I support that.

I mean very specifically that Bill Gates is not a good person and doesn't actually care about helping, he solely wants power and money, and he has placed himself in a perfect shield of public image. Bill Gates is a threat. He has a history of power abuse, and is in a very powerful position right now.

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u/DromaeoDrift 18h ago

lol, go take your horse pills

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u/Danger_Danger 18h ago

Horse Pills?

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u/Neve4ever 17h ago

Kinda funny, since they've shown that giving ivermectin to entire communities actually reduces malaria rates because it cures the mosquitoes lol

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u/protostar71 17h ago

How does a horse dewormer "Cure Mosquitoes"

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u/Neve4ever 16h ago

Ivermectin is an anti-parasitic drug (hence why you'd give it to a horse with a parasite). Ivermectin is one of the most widely prescribed drugs in the world, and is used in humans to clear out parasitic infections.

Malaria is caused by a parasite in mosquitoes. If a mosquitoes slurps on the blood of someone who has taken ivermectin, the drug kills the parasite in the mosquitoe.

Like.. I know it was fun making fun of MAGA for trying to cure COVID with ivermectin. But we don't have to continue to pretend it's only horse paste anymore.

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u/scarletphantom 15h ago

Source besides "trust me bro"?

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u/Neve4ever 13h ago edited 13h ago

Source for what? I'll source every statement from my comment, I guess.

Ivermectin is an anti-parasitic drug

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3043740/

When it first appeared in the late-1970s, ivermectin, a derivative of avermectin (Fig. 1 ) was a truly revolutionary drug, unprecedented in many ways. It was the world’s first endectocide, forerunner of a completely new class of antiparasitic agents, potently active against a wide range of internal and external nematodes and arthropods (hence why you'd give it to a horse with a parasite). Ivermectin is one of the most widely prescribed drugs in the world, and is used in humans to clear out parasitic infections.

Any disagreement about ivermectin being an anti-parasitic drug?

(hence why you'd give it to a horse with a parasite).

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/aug/23/fda-horse-message-ivermectin-covid-coronavirus

That's why people call it a horse dewormer. They give it to horses that have worms (which are parasites).

Ivermectin is one of the most widely prescribed drugs in the world, and is used in humans to clear out parasitic infections.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(19)30453-X/fulltext

Ivermectin is a widely used antiparasitic drug.¹-3 Since 1987, more than 3.7 billion treatments have been donated by Merck through the Mectizan Donation Programme with the goal of eliminating onchocerciasis.

3.7 billion treatments given to humans just for the parasite that causes river blindness.

Malaria is caused by a parasite in mosquitoes.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK215619/

Malaria is caused by plasmodia-ancient, single-celled protozoans transmitted to humans by the bites of female Anopheles mosquitoes

Do you disagree that malaria is caused by a parasite that is transmitted through mosquitoes?

If a mosquitoes slurps on the blood of someone who has taken ivermectin, the drug kills the parasite in the mosquitoe.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23171202/

Ivermectin at sub-lethal concentrations inhibits the sporogony of P. falciparum in An. gambiae. These findings support the utility of ivermectin for P. falciparum transmission control.

P. falciparum is plasmodium falciparum, a malaria parasite. An. gambiae is anopheles gambiae, a mosquito that can carry the parasite. Sporogony is part of the process for how the malaria parasite becomes infectious. Basically, ivermectin stops (inhibits) the process by which the malaria parasite becomes infectious.

At higher doses, ivermectin will just kill the mosquito, because it also works as an insecticide.

Like.. I know it was fun making fun of MAGA for trying to cure COVID with ivermectin.

I don't think I have to source people trying to use ivermectin to cure COVID, since that's literally what we're all referring to, right? That's why you're calling it horse dewormer.

Also, there's a decent chance that ivermectin treated underlying parasitic infections and helped people better survive COVID, and that's likely why data from countries which have higher rates of parasites saw results in studies, while countries with lower rates of parasites saw nothing really happen. Which would suggest that in people who could potentially have parasites, it would be a good adjunct treatment. Higher rates of parasites tend to be observed in red states (hell.. it is speculated that high rates of parasites lead to authoritarianism.. so parasites cause red states; promoting ivermectin may turn red states blue, since there will be fewer brain worms..)

But we don't have to continue to pretend it's only horse paste anymore.

This is obviously just my opinion. I guess we can all play dumb and pretend ivermectin is only given to horses. Like calling steak "dog food" because a dog would eat it. Lol

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u/Basic_Mark_1719 9h ago

Bill Gates isn't the one to fix it. I promise you that billionaires never do anything out of the kindness of their hearts