Latest Aedes aegypti Stories

Without mosquitoes, epidemics of dengue fever and malaria could not plague this planet. The skin-piercing insects infect one person after another while dining on a favorite meal: human blood. Eliminating the pests appears impossible. But scientists are attempting to re-engineer them so they cannot carry disease. If they manage that, they must create enough mutants to mate with wild insects and one day to outnumber them. Researchers chasing this dream, including an N.C. State University...

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (Reuters) - An outbreak of dengue fever in Brazil's tourist mecca of Rio de Janeiro has prompted the authorities to step up prevention measures, fearing a repeat of a 2002 epidemic that killed more than 100 people, officials said on Wednesday. "We have flare-ups in two districts. It needs to be blocked urgently, because without such control we have a risk of having an epidemic again in Rio," Aloisio Ribeiro, head of Rio state government's Epidemiology Vigilance...

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore, fighting its worst dengue epidemic, is optimistic that the number of cases had peaked and will dip in the coming months, a panel of health experts said on Saturday. Twelve Singaporeans have died from the mosquito-borne disease this year and 10,951 cases of dengue fever were reported by September 24 -- 16 percent more than the total number recorded last year when dengue infections rocketed to a 10-year high. "Looking at the trend, it looks like it will...

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Seven people have died of dengue fever in Singapore this year and the number of new cases in the city-state hit a new high last week despite government efforts to clear out mosquito breeding grounds. The weekly bulletin on infectious disease by Singapore's Health Ministry showed 493 new dengue cases reported in the week ending August 28, up nearly a fifth from the previous week's record high of 414, the government said on Thursday. The government has launched a...