PSRA plans breeding guppy fish to curb malaria

Excerpt from Hindustan Times, reported by Bhavika Jain, on July 01, 2010: Read Full Article

With fogging and anti-larvae measure not proving to be effective to curb the mosquito menace, the residents of Chembur have revived an age-old method to control the breeding of larvae.

Pestom Sagar Residents Association (PSRA) have begun a breeding of guppy fish also called as million fish. They leave these fishes into stagnant water puddles, which are sites for mosquito breeding.

This fish is a predator of mosquito eggs and larvae, which lead to the spread of malaria. The residents have also spoken to supervisors of the construction sites near their locality and have released some of these fishes inside the water puddles in their premise.

Construction sites have been identified as high-risk malaria zones by the civic body.“There are four such construction sites where we have released these fishes.These fishes eat the larvae and help in controlling their spread,” said Dr Vijay Sangole of the Pestom Sagar Citizen Forum (PSCF).