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DanielLC comments on Fighting Mosquitos - Less Wrong Discussion
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You're not allowed to kill members of an endangered species. You could try killing them all off before the paperwork gets through, but I suspect that wouldn't go over very well.
It seems like it would be easier to start with Africa, where the species is dangerous to humans and killing it off is more reasonable, and then try to convince other countries to use the technology just to reduce annoyances.
More precisely, you're not allowed to kill members of species your government has designated as endangered.
If the government agrees to your program of eliminating mosquitoes, I don't see many legal problems there. On the other hand, if you don't, I'm pretty sure you won't be allowed to proceed.
Since 1999 Mosquitos killed at least half the amount of Americans as 9/11. Freakonomics said that an American life is worth something between 1 and 10 million dollar for purposes of public policy. It seems like a cost effective intervention for reducing deaths in the US.
(Am I the only one to whose System 1 “the amount of Americans [killed on] 9/11” suggests ‘meh, probably many fewer than die in car accidents every year’, rather than ‘you should be outraged by this!’?)
If I remember right from Freakonomics if the US government can prevent a car death for 1 million dollar they usually want to prevent the death. Even in that reference class this seems like good policy.
Not sure about the number in Freakonomics, but according to the Department of Transportation's 2013 Memorandum, the department values a life at $9.1 million 2012 dollars.
I choose to cite lower bar number, but if you multiply $9.1 million with 1600 cases you get >15 billion and that's three order of magnitude of what eradicating would cost.
That means "you should be outraged by this!" ;)
Nope.
I would guess that there are bio-safety laws besides the endangered species list that come into play when you do interventions on that scale.
Even if laws on the books don't already exist paperwork can be fast if the bureaucracy things you are messing with them. You need the buy in of the power that be.