Malaria: Why does it still exist?

Question

Scientists are these days capable of genetically modifying anything to do pretty much anything, from altering the behaviour of complex creatures such as mammals to making spiders glow in the dark.

So, why is it that a modified form of the mosquito that has stronger genes than normal mossies, one whose genes give it an in-built disease or cause it to die from losing too much fluid, or the females to not be born with a proboscis... hasn't been created and released into the wild en masse?

Yes, anti malarial drugs are big business, but surely someone somewhere can do something about these insufferable malaria-carrying killers without succumbing to whatever leverage these huge multinational pharmaceutical companies can effect.

Or not?

Answer 1

Scientists are in the process of doing exactly that - http://www.malariajournal.com/content/7/...

It's a long process though and malaria most commonly affects third world countries, so research companies don't have much motivation to work in areas were there's a limited financial reward.

Answer 2

Because poorer countries (I hope I'm not offending anyone!) can't afford all the technology it takes to find a cure. They don't have the resources at the moment to research it.

Answer 3

Rachael Carson, "Silent Spring", and the banning of DDT, and the decline in raptor shell quality occurred before DDT.

Answer 4

buy a bat.

Answer 5

today as our science has made development there is evolution in these mosquitoes also .

             earlier also there existed ddt resistant mosquitoes but their number was very few . and when man used ddt all mosquitoes which were not ddt resistance all died .

          this gave a chance to the ddt resistant mosquitoes to increase their number and now they are causing malaria.

         now , you said that why don't we modify their genes with the use of any kind of drug , that's not that easy thing .  

         they are everywhere even at the most cleanest place , so it would surely gonna take a lot of time and for even research because its a very delicate thing to handle .

Answer 6

Actually there is a pretty easy and safe way to prevent malaria, but it is illegal.  

It's like this.  Farmers used to spray DDT on their fields and so a lot of this poison was washed into the sea, where it got into the sea plants which were eaten by fishes which were eaten by birds of prey, resulting in thin eggshells so these birds almost went extinct, and are still recovering.

So they made DDT illegal.

Now, DDT seems to be the only pesticide that is really effective in keeping mosquitoes out of the home.  If people were allowed to use small amounts of this in their homes, it would save millions of lives per year, without harming the birds of prey.  

In more developed countries DDT isn't necessary, because we are able to use more expensive options.  In less developed countries, they can't afford this.   Now, we could either let them use a little DDT, or we could fund the more expensive options to get rid of mosquitoes.  Or we could let the people die of malaria.

Guess which option they chose.

But in my neighborhood, the swallows eat all the mosquitoes.  Good thing, too.  We don't have malaria, but we have West Nile virus.