{"id":295860,"date":"2026-06-04T14:55:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T14:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/295860\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T14:55:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T14:55:10","slug":"google-wants-to-release-millions-of-non-biting-mosquitoes-in-florida-california-heres-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/295860\/","title":{"rendered":"Google wants to release millions of “non-biting” mosquitoes in Florida, California. Here’s why."},"content":{"rendered":"

Google<\/a> is asking for federal approval to release up to 32 million “good” mosquitoes in Florida<\/a> and California<\/a> as part of an effort to reduce populations of disease-carrying insects.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The proposal comes from Google’s life sciences company, Verily, through its Debug mosquito<\/a>-control program press release.<\/a><\/p>\n

The plan would release “non-biting” male mosquitoes that carry a naturally occurring bacterium called Wolbachia,\u00a0according to CBS News partners WPEC.<\/a><\/p>\n

When the males mate with wild female mosquitoes, the resulting eggs do not hatch, reducing mosquito populations over time.<\/p>\n

Since only male mosquitoes would be released, officials say the insects would not bite people or spread disease.<\/p>\n

Those who support the program say the strategy could help reduce the number of mosquitoes that transmit illnesses such as West Nile virus<\/a>. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency<\/a> is reviewing the permit request, WPEC<\/a>\u00a0reports.<\/p>\n

The proposal comes as California health<\/a> officials recently reported a mosquito sample that tested positive for West Nile virus.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Officials say there have been no reported human cases linked to that sample but are encouraging residents to take precautions against mosquito bites.<\/p>\n

Health officials recommend<\/a> using insect repellent, wearing long sleeves and pants when possible, and eliminating standing water around homes where mosquitoes can breed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Google is asking for federal approval to release up to 32 million “good” mosquitoes in Florida and California…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":295861,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[4535,45268,28,5870,571,123,125,124,16687,68805],"class_list":["post-295860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami","tag-california","tag-environmental-protection-agency","tag-florida","tag-google","tag-health","tag-miami","tag-miami-headlines","tag-miami-news","tag-mosquitoes","tag-west-nile-virus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=295860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/295860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/295861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=295860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=295860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=295860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}