So in a year, you could virtually
eliminate malaria.
In practice, we're still a few years out
from being able to do that,
but still, a 1,000 children
a day die of malaria.
In a year, that number
could be almost zero.
The same goes for dengue fever,
chikungunya, yellow fever.
And it gets better.
Say you want to get rid
of an invasive species,
like get Asian carp
out of the Great Lakes.
All you have to do is release a gene drive
that makes the fish produce
only male offspring.
In a few generations,
there'll be no females left, no more carp.
In theory, this means we could restore
hundreds of native species
that have been pushed to the brink.
OK, that's the good news,
this is the bad news.
Gene drives are so effective
that even an accidental release
could change an entire species,
and often very quickly.
Anthony James took good precautions.
He bred his mosquitos
in a bio-containment lab
and he also used a species
that's not native to the US