"Curitiba, Brazil When biologist Antonio Brandão tells people that he works at a mosquito factory, they are often baffled. Why would you make more mosquitoes?, he recalls people asking. "We have enough of them." But once he explains that the laboratory-raised insects can help to stop the spread of dengue - which strikes hundreds of thousands in Brazil each year with fever, headache and bone pain - they come around."
"Brandão is the production manager, not at just any mosquito factory, but at the world's largest, located in the southern Brazilian city of Curitiba. Launched in July, the facility is expected to produce 100 million eggs a week from the mosquito Aedes aegypti. However, unlike wild A. aegypti, the main transmitter of dengue virus, those churned out by the factory carry a harmless Wolbachia bacterium that curbs the insects' ability to spread viruses including dengue and Zika."
Biologist Antonio Brandão manages the world's largest mosquito production facility in Curitiba, Brazil, expected to produce 100 million Aedes aegypti eggs weekly. The lab mosquitoes carry a harmless Wolbachia bacterium that reduces the insects' ability to transmit dengue and Zika. The plan is to release 'wolbitos' to mate with wild mosquitoes so females pass Wolbachia to offspring, gradually converting local populations. Trials in Colombia, Indonesia and Niterói, Brazil showed reduced dengue cases, with Niterói experiencing a 69% drop in treated areas. Brazil adopted the approach amid a surge to 6.5 million dengue cases. Producing millions of mosquitoes presents technical rearing challenges due to temperature sensitivity.
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