An outbreak of blue tongue is an helpless endemic in eastern Australia killing sheep, which has no cure.
This killing virus from Asia is spread by mosquitoes and midges. Found in northern Australian cattle, the virus attack produces no symptoms.
Helpless all these days, here comes a breakthrough solution to the problem. To protect eastern Australia from a blue tongue outbreak, it is just enough to preserve the mosquitoes in alcohol.
Presently, to the relief of the Australians, especially the shepherds, both the location and spread of new strains can be tracked in remote locations — by analysing the mozzies, virologist Lorna Melville said.
Melville said,
There’s been some concerns that some of the virus could get into eastern Australia and the route in could be down through Cape York.
And there’s some evidence from serology that they might have one of the more pathogenic strains coming in there.
But we really need to get the virus to confirm it, so that’s one of the locations where we could use this technology.