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May 30, 2007
by Dr. Roger Bate

side bar side bar side bar side bar Malaria kills about three million people a year, at least a child every 30 seconds in Africa alone. One of the reasons that the disease is so deadly is that there is no vaccine to prevent it, and all the methods to control the mosquito, which spreads the disease, are imperfect and expensive (at least to the most impoverished on the planet).  And it has been killing people all over the world for thousands of years. Those who believe that climate change will imperil them from malarial mosquitoes should think again. Malaria carrying anopheles mosquitoes live nearly everywhere. Even in the Arctic Circle malaria can still kill – and it has taken many in the temperate world, perhaps most notably, Oliver Cromwell, who died in September 1658 in Britain of the disease. Malaria is today, as always, more a disease of poverty than climate.

Given this trail of death, any new approaches to combat this ancient scourge should be welcomed. So it is exciting news that scientists at the Johns Hopkins University’s Malaria Research Institute in Maryland have genetically altered a mosquito so that it still bites and behaves identically to the current anopheles genus of mosquito, but it cannot spread malaria. Although only in the research phase, the plan would be to release millions of engineered mosquitoes into malarial locations in order to breed with malarial mosquitoes. The expectation is that over time the interbreeding would lead to a lowering of the number of mosquitoes carrying the ability to spread the disease.

The key to trying an approach such as this is to introduce insects that have advantages over non-engineered mosquitoes so that they not only survive but thrive. Previous attempts at sterilizing harmful insects to interbreed and lower overall populations have failed because the irradiation came at a cost to the insects and lowered the mating advantage of the sterilized – the fertile wild competitors mated more readily.

But according to the researchers these modified mosquitoes are unaffected by the malarial parasite, whereas their infected cousins are weakened slightly. JHU researchers said that "When fed on Plasmodium-infected blood, the transgenic malaria-resistant mosquitoes had a significant fitness advantage over wild-type." And this alleged advantage could be critical to the technology actually being effective in the field. So far research outcomes are positive; when interbred with equal numbers of wild mosquitoes the modified mosquitoes have won out. Over nine generations of interbreeding, lasting several months, the resulting population was 70 percent modified. The implications are clear, after thirty or forty generations (over a couple of years), the wild mosquito would largely be wiped out and the modified mosquito entirely dominant.

With such a positive result the researchers are naturally excited by the possibilities, but of course one test is far from conclusive. First, there are well over a hundred species of disease carrying mosquito and so far the test has been undertaken with only one species, anopheles stephensi, which is relatively easy to work with, and is found most abundantly in South East Asia. If the researchers find that the results are equally effective with the main African mosquitoes (anopheles Gambiae in particular), then that will be the next step. Second, lab and brief field tests are one thing, but actually seeing a major impact in malarial areas is another matter entirely. There are billions of wild mosquitoes and it might take the introduction of many millions of modified mosquitoes over several decades before a significant impact on disease occurred. And we may not see the mosquitoes introduced for over a decade due to the need for safety testing (introducing a modified organism is subject to myriad long-winded testing regimens).

However, the research is promising and should be pursued further. The real danger is in seeing the breakthrough as the latest panacea for combating the disease - after all we have been awaiting a vaccine for the disease for over thirty years. And pursuit of a vaccine has often side-tracked from interventions that save hundreds of thousands of lives today. The 1980s saw the demise of DDT spraying to prevent malaria, with many funds going into alternative interventions (such as bed nets) that were not as effective, as well as so far unproductive vaccine research. It is important that this new research does not indirectly undermine actual interventions in the field.

And it may do so, because each new breakthrough reduces the likelihood of any substantial funding going into the one area that has saved more lives than any other – insecticide development. DDT was a marvelous breakthrough in 1940, but since then there have only been one or two others, and none to match it in impact. That is because the only significant research is done by agrochemical commercial interests. Bill Gates and the G8 need to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on insecticide research, the result would save lives far faster than genetically modified mosquitoes.

Responses to Professor Robinson Fires Back:

I seems to me that Mr. Hitchen's comments in his Guardian interview parallel very well those of Professor Robinson. Both point to the same issue. Mr. Hitchen's is anti-theistic because he does not want to serve God but be God. I truly appreciate his honesty. All of us deep in our unregenerate hearts want this. He is more honest than most. His challenge is that his presupposition, that he should be ruled by none, results in his interpretation of what are the "facts". No one is free of his bias. He is living out Romans 1. I appreciate Professor Robinson's discussion of the limits of science. It is helpful and insightful. I would challenge him to consider the the ramifications of belief in God and how it may effect his written tone toward another person created in the image of God. I think we need to spend more time in our contemplation on the practical ramifications of faith and particularly how we criticize and yet still honor. This is difficult to get my head around. - Darryl Rearson

Thank you, I didn't realize the Hitchens book was that good. I usually don't like him, but the quotes you cite are excellent. His North Korea analogy is spot-on. I will be buying the book tomorrow. - E.G.

The atheist is listening to the symphony of life with a broken stereo. One channel - that of the soul as it relates to God - is silent. Our atheist is oblivious to this and refuses to accept that anyone else can hear and enjoy more than he can. To him, the only channel that exists is cold reason devoid of any spiritual sensibilities. He is content to live with a closed mind toward the richness of the inner man and he uses mockery and accusation in an attempt to lower those who do not share his cynicism. But, the atheist is not a person without faith. In fact, there is a great faith in the greatest assumption - that he knows enough about our vast universe to assert that there is no God. Such arrogance is common among those who shut out all but their own viewpoint. And, God pity them, they are often so hardened in their position that they refuse reasonable discourse. Singing His Praises, - Jon

I think it a little beneath you to use that picture of Hitchens. Or maybe that’s the best he has? In Christ, - Kieron

I have greatly enjoyed your email newsletter. I thought you might be interested in covering what is developing online among evangelical teens at www.therebelution.com. This website and blog has been linked to by Dr. Albert Mohler, Dr. John Piper and others. The hosts are two 18 year old home schooling twins, the brothers of Joshua Harris, author of I Kissed dating Goodbye. The Rebelution is basically "a teenage rebellion against low expectations," and its battle cry is "Do Hard Things." It is one of the fastest growing Christian youth sites on the web today. Anything you folks can do to help raise the profile of this new youth movement would be a great benefit to young people both within and beyond the church community. God bless you, and again, thanks for your work. Your Servant in Christ, - Gregg Harris

I just discovered your site and am pleased with much I see. I am Principal Investigator for a large Ford Foundation grant to cultivate intelligent "difficult dialogues" concerning religion on the Ohio U. campus and am likely to use elements of your site in the project. Thank you for this resource. A quick question. Do you solicit all the essays you archive? Or, do you consider submissions? - Steve Hays

To those associated with tothesource: I suppose I receive your e-mails because I have taught part-time at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa over the years. I read them and I take issue with what is in your by-line: Challenging Hardcore Secularism with Principled Pluralism. What is hardcore secularism? Is it a valuable book like Loren Eiseley’s The Immense Journey? What about the books of Wendell Berry? Or the fine book entitled Everybody’s Story: Wising Up To The Epic Of Evolution, by my Luther College colleague Loyal D. Rue? Is this hardcore secularism? The people you zero in on, such as Hitchens and Dawkins, are saying the same thing about the world in which we live as the Loren Eiseleys, the Wendell Berrys, and the Loyal Rues of our world, just a little more stridently. I grew up in a Christian home, Norwegian Lutheran. My parents accepted what they were taught to them as religious truths by their parents, who had learned them from their parents, etc., but in the course of their long lives and many experiences they learned to be more critical. You couldn’t find more Christian folks than my parents, but they would not agree with many of the positions you support in the articles you send me. Why all the demonizing on either side? Coming from Mr. Dawkins it is an exasperation with extreme narrow-mindedness and an unwillingness of so many to think, to be informed about what we know and continue to learn about the world we inhabit, and an unwillingness to really see the world around us and come to some logical conclusions about it. I can sympathize with Mr. Dawkins. What you would call a hardcore secular understanding of the world is in fact a magnificent story. Only when we understand that we humans are really one with all creation will humankind stop destroying the only world and only life we have. Christianity, Islam, Judaism nurture the idea of dualism, of separateness. In spite of whatever charitable works happen in the name of Christianity, the dualism it teaches and preaches is a natural path to ultimate destruction. I cannot sympathize with the words of your Mr. Robinson. For all his scholarly credentials, he does not seem to understand the social message of Christianity. And without that you open the floodgates to what we are seeing now, the tragic absurdities of what religion can lead to, the holy wars, the intelligent designers, and the rest. Respectfully, - Jim Skurdall
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We live complex lives. We strive to sort out priorities that sometimes conflict or seem incompatible. A moral framework is needed to help us understand the reality around us. Our Judeo-Christian heritage provides a framework to help us comprehend the choices we make and the conflicts that arise over them. It is not only the main source of our spiritual values, but also many of the secular values we depend on.

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Roger Bate

Dr. Roger Bate is a visiting fellow at AEI. He founded the Environment Unit at the Institute of Economic Affairs in 1993 and co-founded the European Science and Environment Forum in 1994. He is a board member of the South African nongovernmental organization Africa Fighting Malaria.

He has a Ph.D. from Cambridge University and has advised the South African Government on water markets. He is currently working on a book on water policy for AEI.

Dr. Bate is the editor of What Risk? (Butterworth Heinneman, 1997), a collection of papers that critically assess the way risk is regulated in society. His most recent book is Life's Adventure: Virtual Risk in a Real World (Butterworth Heinemann, 2000).
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