HOW CAN THEY BE 100% SURE OF RELEASING ONLY MALES? and why dont they experiment on their own country or territories?? Enter Oxitec, a British biotech firm launched by Oxford University researchers. They patented a method of breeding Aedes aegypti with fragments of proteins from the herpes simplex virus and E. coli bacteria as well as genes from coral and cabbage. This synthetic DNA has been used in thousands of experiments without harming lab animals, but it is fatal to the bugs, killing mosquito larvae before they can fly or bite. Oxitecs lab workers manually remove modified females, aiming to release only males, which feed on nectar and dont bite for blood like females do. The modified males then mate with wild females whose offspring die, reducing the population. Oxitec has built a breeding lab in Marathon and hopes to release its mosquitoes this spring in Key Haven, a neighborhood of 444 homes closely clustered on a relatively isolated peninsula at the north end of Key West. FDA spokeswoman Theresa Eisenman said no field tests will be allowed until the agency has thoroughly reviewed all the necessary information. Company spokeswoman Chris Creese said the test will be similar in size to Oxitecs 2012 experiment in the Cayman Islands, where 3.3 million modified mosquitoes were released over six months, suppressing 96 percent of the targeted bugs. Oxitec says a later test in Brazil also was successful, and both countries now want larger-scale projects. But critics accused Oxitec of failing to obtain informed consent in the Caymans, saying residents werent told they could be bitten by a few stray females overlooked in the lab. Instead, Oxitec said only non-biting males would be released, and that even if humans were somehow bitten, no genetically modified DNA would enter their bloodstream.
Posted on: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 20:45:21 +0000