No engineered endonuclease gene drive capable of spreading via a wild population has yet been published. If successful, their work promises to considerably scale back the inhabitants of this necessary malaria vector. Austin Burt outlined a chic strategy involving the usage of gene drives to disrupt genes that trigger infertility or lethality only when both copies are lost . These ‘genetic load’ drives would spread quickly through minimally impaired heterozygotes when uncommon, and eventually trigger the inhabitants to crash and even turn out to be extinct due to the accumulated load of recessive mutations.

While we are ready to glimpse and debate the details of future developments in healthcare, we have to be clear about the drivers so we will align with them and actively work to make...