Scientists have discovered a microbe carried by some mosquitos that prevents the insects from being infected with malaria parasites - and by extension, from transmitting the deadly disease to humans.
“The data we have so far suggest it is 100% blockage, it’s a very severe blockage of malaria,” the team’s Dr Jeremy Herren told the BBC.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The parasite is responsible for the deaths of around 400,000 people every year, most of them children aged under five, but scientists hope the new findings could “be investigated as a strategy to limit malaria transmission”, says the researcher in a newly published paper in the journal Nature.
Scientists could infect male mosquitoes with Microsporidia MB and then release them into the wild, where the insects would pass it on to females and their offspring. Once at least 40% of a region’s mosquito population is carrying the microbe, malaria infection rates in humans should start to fall, according to experts.
Professor Steven Sinkins, from the Medical Research Council-University of Glasgow Centre for Virus Research, told The Times: “It is a very exciting finding, and we very much hope that we can translate it into a new malaria control tool.”
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––For a round-up of the most important stories from around the world - and a concise, refreshing and balanced take on the week’s news agenda - try The Week magazine. Start your trial subscription today –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
-
Nasa’s new dark matter mapUnder the Radar High-resolution images may help scientists understand the ‘gravitational scaffolding into which everything else falls and is built into galaxies’
-
Is the US about to lose its measles elimination status?Today's Big Question Cases are skyrocketing
-
‘No one is exempt from responsibility, and especially not elite sport circuits’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Israel retrieves final hostage’s body from GazaSpeed Read The 24-year-old police officer was killed during the initial Hamas attack
-
China’s Xi targets top general in growing purgeSpeed Read Zhang Youxia is being investigated over ‘grave violations’ of the law
-
Panama and Canada are negotiating over a crucial copper mineIn the Spotlight Panama is set to make a final decision on the mine this summer
-
Why Greenland’s natural resources are nearly impossible to mineThe Explainer The country’s natural landscape makes the task extremely difficult
-
Iran cuts internet as protests escalateSpeed Reada Government buildings across the country have been set on fire
-
US nabs ‘shadow’ tanker claimed by RussiaSpeed Read The ship was one of two vessels seized by the US military
-
‘Lumpy skin’ protests intensify across France as farmers fight cullIN THE SPOTLIGHT A bovine outbreak coupled with ongoing governmental frustrations is causing major problems for French civil society
-
How Bulgaria’s government fell amid mass protestsThe Explainer The country’s prime minister resigned as part of the fallout
