It is hard to believe that five years have already flown by since we implemented the “Baa Atoll Mosquito and Dengue Fever Control Project” on the Baa Atoll in the Maldives.

The Baa Atoll was the first UNESCO biosphere preserve in the Maldives.  It is an incredibly beautiful set of islands, in a tropical marine paradise!  In 2012 Four Seasons sponsored an extensive project including all of the 13 local island of the Baa Atoll with the objective of improving mosquito control to protect the local people from Dengue Fever.  Twelve young college age volunteers worked 6 days a week, sometimes 12-15 hours a day to implement the project.   I was in awe of their dedication and passion for the project.  Seven volunteers were students at U.C. Santa Cruz in California and five volunteers were Maldivian from the capital island of Male.

Working with young people like these is quite an inspiration!  It gives you hope that we have the capacity to bring about positive change in the world!

Every inch of each island was surveyed by our teams working with local volunteers, government officials and school children to find and eliminate mosquito breeding. Every Saturday major clean ups were organized on each island and as much material as possible was recycled.  One big focus of the project was working with local public health officials to improve processes released to on-going mosquito control. Each island was mapped to show the distribution of mosquito breeding found.  The efforts of the teams were quite successful;  each of the island in the project experienced huge reductions in adult mosquito populations.