Researchers Raise Alarm Over New Breed Of Mosquitoes

Researchers at University of Oxford have raised an alarm over new breed of mosquitoes that resist insecticides.
Referred to as Sephensi,  the species is expanding and worsening fight against malaria across Africa, the group further reports.
The continued expansion puts an additional 126 million people at risk of malaria. Sephensi breeds in water as it thrives in congested cities, where unreliable piped-water systems often force people to store water around their homes, coupled with poor refuse collection.
These breeding grounds provide ample spots for mosquitoes to lay eggs. The species is poised to descend on what public health experts describe as a largely malaria-naive human population. Most urban dwellers do not have immunity from repeated prior exposure and may fall much sicker.
“It’s incredibly worrying: In places with Stephensi established, we see cases going through the roof,” said Sarah Zohdy, who heads a task force on the invasive species for the United States President’s Malaria Initiative, a United States government programme that fights malaria worldwide.
Africa is the least-urban continent, but also the one with the fastest-expanding cities: 50 percent of its population is projected to live in cities by 2030.
Since emerging in Djibouti and Ethiopia, Stephensi has been found in Kenya and Sudan, where the capital cities, Nairobi and Khartoum, are each home to about six million people, and in Nigeria, where the city of Lagos has a population of 16 million, double that of New York.