Sunday, December 23, 2007

Things that sound like a bad idea #875

This little bit of news is one of those things where you go, "huh," and then you maybe go, "cool," and then if you think about it just a little more, you go, "Nope. Sorry. Sounds like a really bad idea," even if they could pull it off. Basically they've tried to genetically engineer a mosquito that has a bacteria in its gut that kills malaria. Which in theory sounds pretty cool. But then you get me thinking about what else that genetically engineered mosquito might one day develop immunity to, or perhaps that eventually, because of this, you get a malaria variant that is immune to the bacteria, and then you have inadvertently engineered a superbug that wipes out everybody. Nice work on that.

I understand malaria is a big deal, but this just seems like a big dangerous box of knives to play with. But hey, what do I know? What do you think?

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