Would you support the intentional extinction of the 40 disease carrying species of mosquito?

[AngryAmish]

I would.

[surrealAmerican]

1. What happens to the animals that eat them?

[GCP]

2. No, because of the Law of Unintended Consequences

Maybe at some point in the future the viruses or spirochetes carried by these mosquitos could be found to be a cure for some incurable disease or infection.

[smilodon populator]

48. Agreed. Better to vaccinate the mosquitoes.

1. Only the females bite.The males live on nectar and pollen. What if the male mosquito is an important pollinator of a food crop? Or an herb that produces an anti-cancer drug? Or just an endangered wildflower? First rule of puzzles: don't throw out any pieces.

2. Other mosquitoes could also spread those same diseases. It's just that those are the ones that live near humans. Eliminate one and another will just step into the vacancy.

3. some current research is suggesting that it is easier to "vaccinate" or make mosquitoes resistant to malaria than to develop a human vaccine. Malaria also makes the mosquito sick so natural selection would favor the resistant individuals and cause resistance to spread.

Some really cool stuff:

http://globalbiodefense.com/2013/05/10/msu-researchers-vaccinate-mosquitoes-to-prevent-malaria/

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/03/19/japan.malaria.mosquitoe.vaccine/

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130911093049.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/02/110215132212.htm

I've seen more on Science Daily, but can't find it on short notice amongst my 1200000074 bookmarks. Yeah, I'm a geek.
And SciD is one of my favorite sites. Along with DU of course.

[WinkyDink]

3. Why? They're here on this planet. Must mean they're supposed to be.

Last edited Tue Jul 22, 2014, 09:16 AM - Edit history (1)

[jberryhill]

31. Does that mean the extinct species aren't supposed to be here?

[Warren DeMontague]

41. You mean like the smallpox virus?

[GeorgeGist]

64. Evolution works by negative selection.

[Spider Jerusalem]

4. What effect would that have on the ecosystem?

[mike_c]

54. it would be devastating for the pathogens who are adapted to use mosquitoes as vectors....

Of course, that's the point. Just off the top of my head, mosquitoes play important roles in some terrestrial and some aquatic food webs, although it's rarely an exclusive role in most habitats, i.e. there's usually at least some redundancy.

[mike_c]

55. I'd rather focus on eradicating the pathogens they vector, although that's often harder....

Vector control is always going to be the low hanging public health fruit. Still, combined with vaccination programs, the vector species might be saved if the pathogens can be eradicated before the vectors are driven to extinction.

LOL-- I have no idea how I ended up replying to my own post, rather then the OP. Senior moment.

[Quantess]

5. Humans need to get their family planning practices in order first.

And even in the event that we got our birth rates down to a globally sustainable level, I'd say no, that is not a good idea.

[AngryAmish]

9. Do you support using disease as a brake on human population growth?

Or am I misstating your position?

[Quantess]

12. Clearly I support family planning as a brake on human population growth.

However, we can't even get the Pope on board to support family planning such as contraceptives in developing countries that are most affected by malaria.

Do you support letting the population grow to an unsustainable level, regardless of the burden on the earth's ecosystems, just because you think it's awful that mosquitoes spread disease? Or am I misstating your position?

Edit to add: Before you get started on the "brown people" thing, I would like to add that we in wealthier countries have our own "population controlling epidemic" looming, unless we stop abusing antibiotics.

I don't have any children myself, BTW.

[clarice]

40. You couldn't BE more correct. nt

[Warren DeMontague]

44. There is no "population problem" in the US.

In countries with good health care and reproductive freedom, human population manages its own growth just fine.

[Hugabear]

25. For thousands of years, disease WAS a brake on human population growth

It's no coincidence that the population of our planet has skyrocketed with the advent of modern medicine.

[Warren DeMontague]

47. And it's no coincidence that imaginary hyperbolic warnings about the "population problem"

are rendered entirely moot in countries with access to reproductive care and contraception, another aspect of that pesky advent of modern medicine.

[closeupready]

6. I know that mosquitoes form a big part of the diet of bats, so

you'd be eliminating a food source for a species of mammal which is already in decline.

[AngryAmish]

10. I read that bats don't eat all that many mosquitos

And not every mosquito species would be targeted. Just the disease carrying ones.

Plus getting rid of Yellow Fever, malaria and the ilk might be worth some bats.

[n2doc]

7. Yes

Other species will replace them in the ecosystem.

[customerserviceguy]

8. Me, too

I would imagine that there are other species of non-disease-carrying mosquito which would expand their numbers to fill this ecological niche, and thus provide food for birds and bats.

To me, it's the same thing as wanting the smallpox virus to become extinct.

[NuclearDem]

11. The disease carrying ones not significant parts of other animals' food supply, yes.

The only lifeform on this planet I'm in favor of exterminating.

[Mariana]

19. Ticks can go away, too, as far as I'm concerned.

I've had Lyme disease, and my mother almost died from Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever.

[bluedigger]

23. I'm with you on the tick.

Maybe we could modify ticks and mosquitos to eat only poison ivy. Now that would make for a paradise.

[dbackjon]

45. And Kudzu

[Warren DeMontague]

53. Kudzu actually holds promise for reducing the cravings associated with alcohol addiction, supposedly

And if it wasn't for Kudzu the cover of the R.E.M. album Murmur wouldn't have looked this cool:

[AngryAmish]

62. I think Kudzu is going places.

[Warren DeMontague]

63. better than this damn English Ivy that some jackhole decided would be a good idea to plant here.

http://extension.oregonstate.edu/gardening/node/948

[blackspade]

46. Now that would be awesome.

Survey work can be hazardous these days with the explosion of ticks, mosquitoes , and poison ivy.
So many people forget that the 'natural' world is actually a built environment by the animals, us included, that live in it.
So many of the 'natural' areas that you see are not actually natural at all, but the result of an abandoned built environment that supports all kinds of invasive species and pests.

[postulater]

13. No. Just vaccinate them all. Herd effect, you know.

[Mariana]

24. There's no vaccine available for malaria

or for several other mosquito-borne diseases.

[badtoworse]

14. Yes, and you can throw in black flies too as far as I'm concerned.

[hedgehog]

56. Black flies are a vital part of song birds' diets at a time when they are laying

eggs and feeding new hatchlings.

[NM_Birder]

15. How?

[AngryAmish]

16. Sterize males, release them in bulk

Been done for decades.

[herding cats]

30. They also breed mosquitoes that are resistant to pathogens.

Last edited Tue Jul 22, 2014, 10:55 AM - Edit history (1)

Which will still suck blood, but they're far less likely to carry disease. As an added bonus they get a a breeding advantage which means the numbers released could be less for their population to spread quickly.

By microinjecting a specially engineered gene into the mosquitoes' eggs, the scientists produced insects that were unable to transmit the disease when they reached adulthood.

More importantly, the gene that James' team created was dominant. In other words, introducing it into a wild population of mosquitoes would achieve the same result as placing a group of brown-eyed humans into a blue-eyed population: gradually, fewer children would be born with the recessive, blue-eyed gene.

This means that releasing the mosquitoes in strategic locations could dramatically reduce the spread of malaria, James said.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/malaria-resistant-mosquitoes-lab-bred-first-time/

In all probability this is the route science will be taking to help spread diseases carried by mosquitoes.

[Chan790]

17. Yes.

No more Malaria. No more Eastern Equine Encephalitis. No more Dengue. No more Chikungunya. No more Heartworm. No more Yellow Fever. No more St. Louis Encephalitis. No more LaCrosse Encephalitis. No more Western Equine Encephalitis. No more West Nile Virus. No more Japanese Encephalitis. No more Rift Valley Fever. No more.

No more.

This should have been a priority decades ago.

[Mariana]

20. It was a priority decades ago.

They used DDT.

[Chan790]

34. That's a Faustian bargain then...

Poisons that fuck up human DNA on the one hand or terrible diseases on the other. Well, we can do it today at-least.

Still off all the mosquitoes.

[Mariana]

38. There really was an attempt to eradicate malaria, in particular.

It worked pretty well for awhile - malaria deaths were way down. DDT is very effective at killing mosquitoes, after all. The project was pretty much abandoned when news of the environmental damage caused by DDT came out, coupled with the rise of DDT-resistant populations of mosquitoes.

DDT is still used in some places to try to control the spread of malaria.

[KittyWampus]

18. You'd simultaneously wipe out bats and barn swallows and frogs.

[Mariana]

21. There are thousands of species of mosquitoes.

You think eliminating 40 of them would wipe out bats, barn swallows and frogs?

[Hugabear]

26. Have you conducted any environmental studies to suggest it wouldn't have a significant effect?

Or are you just guessing?

[Mariana]

32. I guessed nothing. I asked for a clarification.

The poster made a very specific claim. I think the poster may have been mistaken and thought the proposal in the OP was to eliminate ALL mosquitoes, not just a tiny percentage of them.

Of course it would have a significant environmental effect. It would remove those diseases as a factor, not just in human populations, but in those of any other animals that are susceptible to these diseases. However, I don't see how it would "wipe out bats, tree swallows and frogs".

It may be possible to temporarily extinguish a species of mosquito in a particular environment. Keep an uninfected population going in a lab, exterminate the wild mosquitoes, and when the disease is extinct, release the lab mosquitoes.

[AngryAmish]

58. OP here. Just the disease carrying ones.

[The2ndWheel]

22. Might makes right?

Like was said, unintended consequences, some good, some bad. Although, if we didn't intentionally make a species extinct, that would also have unintended consequences, some good, some bad. So, either way...

[DirkGently]

27. If only they had lush, glossy fur. Or drumsticks. n/t

[Coventina]

28. I would have to have a lot more information before I would support it.

At this point, I cannot give a yes or no answer.

[tavernier]

29. No; I support the extinction of ALL of them!

They are so BAD this year here in the Keys because we didn't get any cold weather this past winter. And you can add to the extinction list the dumb ass tourists who come down in January and say "I sure hope there aren't any cold spells while I'm here."

Pardon me. The milk of human kindness that normally flows through my veins has been diluted with DDT this summer.

[demwing]

66. Those "dumb ass tourists"

help keep our state from requiring a state income tax, and provide hundreds of thousands of jobs to Florida, thank you very much.

In fact, the tourists are often as smart as/smarter than half the residents of Florida. Why do you think our state is purple when the rest of the deep south is deep red?

[randome]

33. If we were advanced enough to make them extinct...

...we'd be advanced enough to prevent them from spreading disease.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Don't ever underestimate the long-term effects of a good night's sleep.[/center][/font][hr]

[Chan790]

36. We've been advanced enough to exterminate for decades...

as others have pointed out, it means using DDT. We don't want to use DDT so...we haven't exterminated the mosquito.

[Throd]

35. No.

[geek tragedy]

37. For invasive, spreading species like Adeles Aegyptus, certainly nt

[In_The_Wind]

39. What are the risk involved?

[Warren DeMontague]

42. Yes.

[el_bryanto]

43. Mosquitos? Why stop there? Kill 'em all.

I hate mosquitos. And based on their actions, they aren't fond of me either (although they do enjoy my blood).

Bryant

[NightWatcher]

49. I just want to keep them out of my yard. My girl reacts to their bites

I however live in the swamps of NE Florida where skeeters rule

[ohheckyeah]

50. I am not smart enough to know

what the possible ramifications of doing so are.

It seems not a lot of time and thought is given to consequences as evidenced by kudzu.

[Mariana]

59. Kudzu was introduced in the late 1800's. nt.

[ohheckyeah]

60. And again in the 1930s and 1940s....

which doesn't change the fact that it is a real problem in many areas now. That's rather the point. What we do or don't do now affects the future.

[liberal N proud]

51. Any mosquito that bites me should die

[Paper Roses]

52. I'd love to see the end of mosquito's but I know it would be bad.

So many birds, and perhaps others in the animal world depend on them for food. Have we not messed up enough? Leave the winged demons alone.

[hedgehog]

57. If we kill all the disease carrying mosqitoes, what's to keep the disease organisms from

jumping to another species of mosquito?

There may be a middle ground; limiting or eliminating human exposure to such mosquitoes. For example - yellow fever is not an annual scourge in Philadelphia or New Orleans these days - but it could be if mosquito breeding grounds are allowed to reestablish themselves. One method of limiting exposure is the simple use of treated bed nets.

[LWolf]

61. It depends.

How will they be exterminated? What are the side effects, intentional and not?

[GeorgeGist]

65. Your argument is hard to refute.

Since it has no substance.