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KUALA LUMPUR: The Ministry of Health is studying the implementation of artificial intelligence as part of the fight against the dengue epidemic.
His Minister, Datuk Seri Dr. Dzulkefly Ahmad (Pix) It is hoped that AI will serve as a preventive measure to curb the epidemic.
"With his help (AI), we can predict the probability of mosquito growth based on local demographics."
"This is one of the methods we are working on and we are currently conducting a pilot project in Penang," said Dzulkefly at the launch of the Aedes mosquito injected with the bacterium Wolbachia in an effort to eradicate the disease, in Sri Rakyat Aparments to Bukit Jalil here.
Dzulkefly said that the release of mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia could also reduce reliance on the use of insecticides to control the mosquito population and also combat the growing number of dengue cases.
"Insecticides can have other side effects," he added, adding that dengue cases had increased 92.4% nationwide in the first six months of 2019 .
Dzulkefly said that there were 62,421 dengue cases between January 1 and June 29 this year with 93 deaths, compared with 32,435 cases with 53 deaths in the same period last year.
According to Dzulkefly, Malaysia will be the second country in the world to adopt the method of "fighting fire with fire", after Australia.
The initiative came after the success of the 2017 pilot project in eight areas of Selangor, which reduced the number of dengue cases at each site from 50% to 80%.
The program enabled the release of 180 containers containing Aedes infected mosquito eggs from the bacteria at 11 locations in Kuala Lumpur, Putrajaya and Selangor, which were released in phases.
The bacterium Wolbachia prevents the dengue virus from developing in the mosquito, which then stops directly transmitted by bites.
Wolbachia is also spread by the breeding process. When an infected female mates with an uninfected man, she produces mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia.
When a male mosquito infected with Wolbachia with an uninfected female, the eggs do not hatch.
According to Dzulkefly, wolbachia presents no danger to man.
The program will be extended to other states in September.
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