Is Bill Gates manufacturing and releasing genetically modified mosquitoes to turn them into flying vaccinators? No, that's not true: The "world's biggest mosquito factory" in Medellin, Colombia, does not belong to Gates. Those are regular Aedes aegypti mosquitoes that have not been genetically modified; the aim is to prevent mosquito-borne diseases in a natural way.
The claim appeared in a video on TikTok (archived here) on June 7, 2023 under the title (translated from Bulgarian to English by Lead Stories staff) "Bill Gates' Mosquito Factory in Medellin, Colombia. Researchers turn mosquitoes into flying vaccinators. Theoretically, insects could protect against various diseases, but... There is another side to the question, especially when Bill Gates is involved." The caption (translated from Bulgarian to English by Lead Stories staff) opened:
The first genetically modified mosquitoes released into the United States. The biotech company Oxitec launched controversial field tests of its insects in Florida in 2021. In 2022, they launched the project in Indonesia. Obviously, no one is dealing with the legal issue anymore and in 2023 the factories are still working.
This is what the post looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Tue Jun 27 19:18:55 2023 UTC)
Social media users in Bulgaria are sharing a video claiming that Bill Gates is manufacturing and releasing 30 million genetically produced mosquitoes every week from his mosquito factory in Colombia. The comments of the viewers say that this is the new distribution approach of vaccines by insects:
In other words, people will be injected without even suspecting what exactly has been infused into their body.
You can't say No 😏
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Tue Jun 27 20:13:18 2023 UTC)
The "world's biggest mosquito factory" in Medellin does not belong to Gates. It belongs to the World Mosquito Program, run by Monash University. Gates has funded the World Mosquito Program through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The original mosquito factory video is not new. It was posted by Bill Gates on his YouTube channel on August 15, 2022.
The video says that the Wolbachia bacteria, which infect half of all insect species naturally, are the only infection the mosquitoes receive. The World Mosquito Program also clearly states on its website that these are not genetically modified mosquitos:
Source: Screenshot taken on Tue Jun 27 20:29:13 2023 UTC)
The Wolbachia bacteria can fight viruses like dengue, Zika, chikungunya and yellow fever in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. Scientists found that Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes had lower viral loads and could not transmit the viruses. A trial in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, showed that these mosquitoes cut dengue cases by 77 percent and hospitalizations by 86 percent. Another study in Medellin, where the mosquitoes were released in 2015, reported an 89 percent drop in dengue cases.
Other Lead Stories fact checks about Bill Gates can be found here.
Other Lead Stories fact checks about mosquitoes can be found here.
