(UFMG -2003)The Bug is BackHealth authorities defe

(UFMG - 2003)

The Bug is Back

Health authorities defeated dengue decades ago by vanquishing the mosquito that spreads ²it. Then why were half a million Brazilians sick this past summer?

It's not a pretty sight. The Aëdes aegypti mosquito, which spreads dengue and yellow fever, was eradicated decades ago. But the ¹bug is back with a vengeance. It gave Brazil a dengue epidemic. Scientists now say the worst is yet to come. Why is nothing being done?

Brazil is a case study of how badly things went awry. Twice the aggressive ⁴mosquito battalions had freed Brazilian territory of Aëdes aegypti in 1955 and again in 1973. But these were the days of an ambitious military regime in Brazil, which had bigger things than bugs on its agenda. Instead of diligently tracking the disease, the generals poured money into highways, power plants and winning the Amazon frontier. When the dengue mosquito resurfaced, in 1976, Brasilia reacted swiftly – to hush it up, under the cloak of national security.

The generals are gone now, but the government continues to botch opportunities. There is no mystery, scientists say, to eradicating dengue: destroy the mosquito and ³its eggs , and the virus cannot prosper. Yet spraying is rarely done, except after an epidemic has hit. "No one bothers with disease control until people start going to the hospital," says Hermann Schatzmayr, head of virology at Rio's Oswaldo Cruz Foundation. Aëdes aegypti is now at home in 3,700 counties, including 60 percent of Brazil, and increasingly resistant to pesticides.

Newsweek, June 17, 2002. p. 40-41.

Which of the following words is NOT used to refer to 'Aedes aegypti'??