• The insecticides that target disease-spreading mosquitoes are running into nature’s ultimate defense mechanism: evolution.
• Scientists reported Wednesday that mosquitoes in Cambodia and Vietnam increasingly carry a mutation that makes them resistant to a commonly deployed insecticide.
• The report, in the journal Science Advances, tells the story of Aedes aegypti, a vector for dengue, yellow fever, chikungunya, Zika and other diseases.
• The researchers found that in Cambodia and Vietnam, 78 percent of sampled mosquitoes had a mutation that, in laboratory studies, showed resistance to permethrin, which is part of a class of insecticides known as pyrethroids.

Tagged: Health & Wellness