Plasmodium falciparum
Plasmodium falciparum is a unicellular protozoan parasite of humans, and the deadliest species of "Plasmodium" that cause malaria in humans. It is transmitted through the bite of a female "Anopheles" mosquito. It is responsible for roughly 50% of all malaria cases. It causes the disease's most dangerous form called falciparum malaria. It is therefore regarded as the deadliest parasite in humans, causing 435,000 deaths in 2017. It is also associated with the development of blood cancer (Burkitt's lymphoma) and is classified as Group 2A carcinogen.
Mosquito-borne disease
From the success seen in Australia, the researchers were able to begin operating in more threatened portions of the world. The Eliminate Dengue program spread to 10 countries throughout Asia, Latin America, and the Western Pacific blooming into the non-profit organization, World Mosquito Program, as of September 2017. They still use the same technique of infecting wild populations of "Ae. aegypti" as they did in Australia, but this time their target disease has shifted to include Zika and chikungunya on top of dengue. Although not alone in their efforts to use "Wolbachia-"infected mosquitoes to reduce mosquito-borne disease, the World Mosquito Program method is praised for being self-sustaining in that it causes permanent phenotype change rather than reducing mosquito populations through cytoplasmic incompatibility through male-only dispersal.