The Nouméa town hall in New Caledonia released Wednesday in the wild the first mosquitoes to which a bacterium to eradicate dengue was inoculated, as part of an innovative health program. During a ceremony held in the city center of the Caledonian capital, some 500 "wolbachia" mosquitoes were released from small laboratory boxes, after being infected by the bacteria of the same name.
Australian researchers have shown that the inoculation of this bacterium with Aedes Aegypti, a tiger mosquito ranked among the most dangerous in the world, blocked the transmission to humans of dengue, zika and chikungunya.
"A harmless bacteria for man and the environment"
"This is a bacterium that occurs naturally in 60% of insects and is harmless to humans and the environment," said Dr. Nadège Rossi, head of the World Mosquito Program in Nouméa. In March 2018, the Australian University of Monash, the government of New Caledonia, the Pasteur Institute and the city of Nouméa partnered to experiment with this innovative biological method of fighting these diseases. This is a first on the French territory, while the method has already been successfully tested in a dozen countries including Australia, Brazil or Indonesia.
"The results have been extremely conclusive with the disappearance of dengue epidemics in all areas that have been treated," said Tristan Derycke, deputy mayor in charge of health issues. For six months, "wolbachia" mosquitoes will be released every week in Noumea "while the mosquito population is renewed and there are only" wolbachia "mosquitoes in the wild. He also said he was "hopeful" that all of New Caledonia would adopt this process, which puts an end to insecticide spraying.
"The epidemics are getting longer and appear clinically more and more severe"
Since the beginning of the year, two people, including an 8 year old girl, died of dengue in New Caledonia, nearly 4,000 people were infected and 300 hospitalized. "The epidemics are getting longer and appear clinically more severe with deaths every year and sequelae in ocular or hepatic terms," said Tristan Derycke, a doctor. In 2017, 13 people in New Caledonia succumbed to arbovirosis, which causes joint pain and high fever and is lethal when it becomes hemorrhagic or attacks a vital organ.