Patch which claims to make humans 'invisible' to Malaria mosquitoes

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Sunil

Britain may be bathed in sunshine, but for those who find themselves the unfortunate target of mosquitoes, the desire to expose skin remains minimal.

But now a technology firm based in California claims to have the answer - a patch which makes the wearer invisible to the insects.

The Kite Patch uses non-toxic compounds that disrupt mosquitoes' ability to find people through CO2 for up to 48 hours.

The technology was developed by Olfactor Laboratories and the University of California at Riverside, with backing from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

For most people in Britain bites can be painful, itchy or become infected.

But for large parts of the developing world, it is much more serious.

Mosquitoes spread malaria which killed 660,000 people in 2010, according to the World Health Organisation.

But research published last year suggested the total is actually double that number and closer to 1.2million.

The UN had set a target of eliminating the disease by 2015 but that now looks unlikely.

The countries worst hit are in central and western Africa.

Most deaths occur in children but a fifth also kill people aged 15 to 49.

Crowdfunding website Indiegogo is running a campaign to raise $75,000 to send 20,000 Kite patches for large-scale testing in Uganda, where malaria rates are over 60 percent.