California may soon serve as the pioneering site for one of Google’s boldest public health initiatives to date.
The tech behemoth is pursuing federal authorization to deploy up to 32 million genetically modified mosquitoes across California and Florida over the next two years. This initiative aims to curb the transmission of various mosquito-borne diseases, such as West Nile virus, St. Louis encephalitis, dengue fever, Zika virus, chikungunya, and yellow fever.
The US Environmental Protection Agency is currently evaluating this proposal and is open to public feedback until June 5, after which it will decide on granting an experimental use permit.
Officials have yet to disclose the specific locations for mosquito releases, pending approval of the plan.
The focus of the current project is on Culex mosquitoes, a species notorious for spreading West Nile virus and St. Louis encephalitis.
As highlighted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, West Nile virus continues to be the most prevalent mosquito-borne illness in the United States.
Those viruses are already established in California, where they circulate naturally among local bird and mosquito populations.
On Friday, a positive sample of West Nile virus was confirmed in Riverside County.
The project is part of Google’s little-known Debug initiative, launched more than a decade ago to develop new technologies aimed at reducing populations of disease-carrying mosquitoes.
Rather than releasing biting insects, the company plans to release male mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia, a naturally occurring bacteria. When the infected males mate with wild female mosquitoes, the offspring do not survive, helping suppress mosquito populations over time.
Because only female mosquitoes bite humans, experts say the releases would not increase the number of biting mosquitoes.
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“It’s a great concept, and we’re putting it to real use to see if it works,” Chad Huff, public information officer for the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District, told KVUE.
Huff said mosquito control agencies have been exploring alternatives to traditional pesticide-based methods for years.
Brent Nye, a Florida resident, was less convinced
“I think it’s interesting,” he told 10 Tampa Bay News. “I’m not sure whether I would want them in my backyard because there are going to be a lot of things that go wrong. I’d rather have some other state to experiment on.”
Google says artificial intelligence and robotic systems would be used to breed, sort and release the mosquitoes at a scale large enough to make the strategy effective.
