ABSTRACT

This edited volume brings together natural scientists, social scientists and humanists to assess if (or how) we may begin to coexist harmoniously with the mosquito. The mosquito is humanity’s deadliest animal, killing over a million people each year by transmitting malaria, yellow fever, Zika and several other diseases. Yet of the 3,500 species of mosquito on Earth, only a few dozen of them are really dangerous—so that the question arises as to whether humans and their mosquito foe can learn to live peacefully with one another.

Chapters assess polarizing arguments for conserving and preserving mosquitoes, as well as for controlling and killing them, elaborating on possible consequences of both strategies. This book provides informed answers to the dual question: could we eliminate mosquitoes, and should we? Offering insights spanning the technical to the philosophical, this is the “go to” book for exploring humanity’s many relationships with the mosquito—which becomes a journey to finding better ways to inhabit the natural world.

Mosquitopia will be of interest to anyone wanting to explore dependencies between human health and natural systems, while offering novel perspectives to health planners, medical experts, environmentalists and animal rights advocates.

The Open Access version of this book, available at

https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781003056034, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license

part I|46 pages

Could we (should we) eliminate mosquitoes?

chapter 1|13 pages

Killing mosquitoes

Think before you swat
Size: 1.57 MB

chapter 2|16 pages

The mosquito

An introduction
Size: 0.28 MB

chapter 3|15 pages

Understanding multispecies mobilities

From mosquito eradication to coexistence
Size: 1.68 MB

part II|60 pages

Learning from experience

chapter 4|12 pages

The long arc of mosquito control

Size: 3.94 MB

chapter 5|12 pages

Domesticated Mosquitoes

Colonization and the growth of mosquito habitats in North America
Size: 0.10 MB

chapter 6|14 pages

Could we/should we eradicate mosquitoes?

The case of the yellow fever vector 1
Size: 0.89 MB

chapter 7|20 pages

Fighting nuisance on the northern fringe

Controlling mosquitoes in Britain between the World Wars
Size: 1.57 MB

part III|56 pages

Know thy enemy

chapter 8|14 pages

The mosquito and malaria

Would mosquito control alone eliminate the disease?
Size: 0.35 MB

chapter 9|21 pages

Living with mosquitoes in disease-free contexts

Attitudes and perceptions of risk in English wetlands
Size: 4.05 MB

chapter 10|19 pages

AweWonderExcitement

Size: 8.85 MB

part IV|48 pages

Know thyself

chapter 11|18 pages

Enacting politics with mosquitoes

Beyond eradication and control
Size: 5.18 MB

chapter 12|12 pages

Eradication against ambivalence

Size: 1.16 MB

chapter 13|16 pages

The innocent mosquito?

The environmental ethics of mosquito eradication
Size: 0.19 MB

part V|73 pages

Improving human–mosquito relationships

chapter 14|21 pages

Mosquito control

Success, failure and expectations in the context of arbovirus expansion and emergence
Size: 2.17 MB

chapter 15|14 pages

Designer mosquitoes?

Prospects and precautions of genome-edited insects for public health
Size: 0.33 MB

chapter 16|13 pages

The Mosquitome

A new frontier for sustainable vector control
Size: 0.26 MB

chapter 17|14 pages

Mosquito utopias and dystopias

A dispatch from the front lines
Size: 0.83 MB

chapter |9 pages

Afterword

Size: 0.21 MB