Malaysian prince here on mission to wipe out mosquitoes

Sometimes it takes a blue blood to step up the war on those pesky bloodsuckers.

A Malaysian prince is here in the Philippines to help campaign for dengue fever prevention while brandishing a technology which he said could kill “five generations” of mosquitoes that carry the dreaded virus.

Prince Tunku Naquiyuddin Ja’afar, son of the 10th King of Malaysia Tuanku Ja’afar, spearheaded yesterday’s launch of “CounterStrike Lamok,” the local version of his global advocacy for an integrated mosquito management program involving the government, the business sector, and local communities.

In a press conference at Crowne Plaza at Ortigas Center, Pasig City, Naquiyuddin presented what at first appeared to be a plastic packet of rice husks.

“This is a game-changing technology that can kill five generations of mosquitoes,” he said, referring to the mosquito larvae-killing substance called Mousticide Biolarvicide.

A dengue-carrying female Aedes aegypti mosquito can lay at least five clutches of eggs in its 30-day life span, he said.

Hence, if these pests are killed as early as in their larval stage, five generations of offspring can be essentially wiped out, he explained.

A former diplomat, Naquiyuddin is into environmentalism as a committee member of the World Wide Fund for Nature in Malaysia.

He is also the founder of Yayasan Tunku Naquiyuddin, a global nonprofit organization engaged in raising awareness on dengue prevention and control.

He has interests in several companies, including a coal-fired power plant, a coke manufacturing plant in China, and EntoGenex Industries, the manufacturer of the mosquito larvae killer.

The Malaysian prince had initiated a similar campaign in his home country called “Stop Dengue Mission,” which he said had four components collectively dubbed REAP, for “reduction of the mosquito population, education, awareness, and prevention of mosquito bites.”

‘Invisible menace’

He called dengue an “invisible menace” in Malaysia, where it had mostly victimized women and children and caused more deaths compared to other diseases.

“The news about dengue is always on the inside pages of newspapers, unlike the AH1N1 virus which lands on the page one. But dengue has claimed more lives,” he said.

Dengue fever has been a perennial problem in Malaysia that its government resorted early this year to tapping genetically modified mosquitoes to stem the growing population of the species.

In January, Malaysia released swarms of genetically modified mosquitoes into a forest in the first experiment of its kind in Asia aimed at curbing dengue fever. The mosquitoes were purportedly designed to produce offspring with shorter lives, thus curtailing the population.

Only female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes spread dengue fever, which killed 134 people in Malaysia last year.

But the project sparked widespread fears that it might breed an even more uncontrollable type of deadly mosquitoes.

It was eventually stopped due to public clamor, according to Dr. Alan Brandt, cofounder and director of biotechnology company EntoGenex Industries based in Kuala Lumpur.

The product’s active ingredient, taken from the ovary of mosquitoes, was sourced from EntoGenex and mixed with rice husks at the laboratory of its Philippine distributor, Renew Philippines Inc., in Laguna province.

Initial trials

Ronald Allan Cruz, Renew Philippines president and CEO, said the company had just started introducing the product to local government units, with initial trials conducted in dengue hot spots in the cities of Pasig and Makati.

The substance is mainly sprinkled on stagnant pools of water, like street ditches and canals, where mosquitos breed.

At present, the Philippine government’s antidengue measures include the distribution of the so-called Ovicidal/Larvicidal Trap system, a kit costing P15 each and which uses pellets to kill mosquito eggs.

Recently in Metro Cebu, another antidengue drive used a larvicidal powder solution called “Abate” in swamps and stagnant water to prevent the spread of dengue that claimed 102 lives in Cebu last year.

The Cebu Medical Society president, Dr. Neil Camonggol, said that Abate was a brand name of larvicide temephos, a nontoxic, internationally accepted larvicide that killed Aedes aegypti larvae.

Response to WHO call

Coming to Manila with his own product, Prince Naquiyuddin said Mousticide Biolarvicide was also nontoxic, biodegradable and has been approved by the Philippine Food and Drug Administration.

The prince said CounterStrike Lamok was launched in response to the World Health Organization’s call for  member countries to take a more committed and coordinated action against dengue.

Globally, around 2.5 billion people are considered at risk of dengue, with 70 percent of them living in the Asia Pacific region.

In the Philippines, the Department of Health has officially counted 70,204 dengue cases from January to September this year. The number is still around 25 percent lower than for the same period in 2010.

At least 396 dengue-related deaths have been reported so far in the country this year, 60 percent lower compared to the same period last year at 620. With a report from Inquirer Research