this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2024
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Putting aside questions of ecosystems etc, I think the main reason is that we just can't - ironic since we seem to be extint-ing all the other animals
In South America they tried in the 50s and 60s, and more kept cropping up. They breed so quickly, if you miss an area they can just rebound. Then more can come in on ships and stuff
So you couldn't really localise it, it would have to be a huge global undertaking. And it would likely require widespread use of pesticides that are at best tricksy and at worst illegal, not to mention environmentally shitty
Most modern plans for eradication involve creating a virus that handles it, rather than a pesticide.
Have the virus introduce a gene that takes a few generations of breeding in the impacted population before it starts to debilitate or sterilize the mosquitoes. That way your virus can start to kill the population even as it spreads to areas that were missed.
Also significant politics within the field preventing integrated approaches to control. It's possible we could target specific species of mosquito that are vectors for deadly disease, with the intent of eradicating the disease by suppressing the vector. It would be the greatest collective undertaking of human kind. We'd have to shelf things like international borders and profits.
We're stuck with being annoyed in any case.