Wolbachia who?

Honestly, I knew the bare minimum about this and yes, I did have a hard time trying to pronounce Wolbachia. (Pronounced Wool-baa-ki-ya).

Also no, it is not the name of a new restaurant or food (if that is what you were hoping to read about). It is actually a safe bacterium carried by mosquitoes to reduce disease carrier mosquitoes. Those mosquitos that spread diseases such as Dengue, Zika and Chikungunya.

I used to work for the Ministry of Health & Medical Services about 3 years ago, and I am quite familiar with mosquito-transmitted diseases and the fact that it has affected many Fijians and sadly caused deaths. Which is why, I thought it important to talk about this this World Mosquito Day. Did you know that these tiny little blood sucking insects are ranked as the most death causing insects in the world?

While clean-up campaigns have been the norm in fighting mosquito-borne diseases, the World Mosquito Program’s innovative Wolbachia method works to reduce diseases such as dengue, chikungunya and Zika in a rather more “natural” way – by releasing mosquitoes.

These are our own Fijian Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to be clear. The Aedes aegypti mosquito is the primary mosquito responsible for outbreaks of diseases like dengue. The only thing that sets the ones being released is that they carry something special inside their bodies – Wolbachia. When Wolbachia is inside the body of this mosquito, the good bacteria stop viruses growing inside the mosquito. And if the virus can’t grow, it can’t be transmitted to people.

When Wolbachia carrying mosquitoes are released in the environment, it breeds with the wild Aedes aegypti mosquitoes – passing Wolbachia to their offspring, in other words, their babies! This method has been used in 9 countries successfully. In Fiji, releases have been completed in Lami, Suva and Nakasi while releases are continuing in the Burning West.

You should be aware and bothered about these things because these tiny little blood sucking insects are ranked as the most death causing insects in the world! Despite this wonderful initiative, it is important that we keep our environment clean and free from items/rubbish that collects stagnant water, allowing disease-carrying mosquitoes to breed.

To learn more about the Wolbachia method, check out this video. Keep up with the latest from the WMP in Fiji on their Facebook page or visit www.worldmosquito.org for more information.