Cleansing mosquitoes from their infections instead of killing them has been found to be a novel solution to get rid of malaria, which claims nearly 600,000 people a year, mostly children.
The next stage test of the new discovery has been scheduled to take place in Ethiopia.
Scientists in the United States Harvard University recommended that mosquitoes should be given malaria drugs to clear their infection so they can no longer spread the disease.
They found a pair of drugs which can successfully rid the insects of malaria when absorbed through their legs. Coating bed nets in the drug cocktail is the long-term aim
The conventional way of fighting malaria has largely relied on killing mosquitoes with insecticide rather than curing them of malaria, as well as sleeping under bed net and administering vaccines to protect children living in high-risk malaria areas.
However, mosquitoes have become resistant to insecticide in many countries so the chemicals no longer kill the insects as effectively as they used to.
According to WHO’s latest World malaria report, there were an estimated 263 million cases worldwide in 2023. This represents about 11 million more cases in 2023 compared to 2022,
And the disease has claimed many lives in WHO African Region than any other region.
"We haven't really tried to directly kill parasites in the mosquito before this, because we were just killing the mosquito," says researcher Dr Alexandra Probst, from Harvard.
However, she says that approach is "no longer cutting it".
The researchers analyzed malaria's DNA to find possible weak spots while it is infecting mosquitoes, BBC reported.
In their article in Nature, the scientists describe two highly effective drugs that killed 100% of the parasites. The drugs were tested on material similar to bed nets.
"Even if that mosquito survives contact with the bed net, the parasites within are killed and so it's still not transmitting malaria," said Dr. Probst.
"I think this is a really exciting approach, because it's a totally new way of targeting mosquitoes themselves."
She says the malaria parasite is less likely to become resistant to the drugs as there are billions of them in each infected person, but less than five in each mosquito.
The effect of the drugs lasts for a year on the nets, potentially making it a cheap and long-lasting alternative to insecticide, the researchers say.
This approach has been proven in the laboratory. The next stage is already planned in Ethiopia to see if the anti-malarial bed nets are effective in the real world.
WHO reported that between 1 January and 20 October 2024, over 7.3 million malaria cases and 1157 deaths in Ethiopia, showing that malaria poses a significant public health challenge in the country.