Reconcile Yourself to Insects---Insects will be the important key to solve the issues

My own memory about insects and 17-year cicadas

          I don’t have any good memory of insects. How about you? Honestly I hate them. Some of them sting, bite, suck the blood, poison and carry diseases. I dislike their buzzing sounds, thorny legs, dry wings, hard shells and soft abdomens. In short, I hate them as a whole existence. Five-year-old me went screaming to have seen a greenish shiny beetle with the long antennae sitting on my chest while I was playing on the swing. It was a hot summer day.
          With the tons of thousands of 17-year cicadas emerged, the eastern USA has drawn attention this summer(*1). They have a demonic appearance with the red eyes and the black skin. The males’ noises to attract females for mating are bothersome and their last shed shells are piled up under the trees. Furthermore the fungal disease is spreading among them and causes to be torn off their abdomen(*2). Shamefully the male cicadas with the disease are still alive and try to mate with females in spite of the state of losing their reproductive organ. Disgusting!

Edible insects and eating bug tradition of Japan

          However, edible insects are getting recognized more and more recent years. I found the cricket flour and the mealworms products on the Internet(*3). It is said that they are full of protein and dietary fibers. They can be good food for the people with intolerance to gluten (protein of wheats). The cricket based dog foods are also available. 

          In Japan there have been the insects eating traditions too: the grasshoppers simmered in the sugared soy sauce, the adult wasps deep fried , the hornets’ larvae and pupae cooked with rice and silkworm moths’ pupae simmered in the sugared soy sauce have been eaten. They were the source of protein in the local regions more than a half century ago(*4). 

COVID 19 and insects

          COVID 19 vaccine is actually related to insects. There are three types of vaccines so far according to the producing processes and the working mechanisms: messenger RNA vaccine, which is adopted by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. Viral vector vaccine by AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson’s. Spike protein vaccine by Shionogi, one of the Japanese pharmaceutical companies, and Novavax. The SARS-Cov-2’s spike protein vaccine is produced in the insect protein culture. This technique isn’t a new one that has been used to make the flu vaccine these years. The messenger RNA technique, however, is a brand new and no one knows about the long term influence or side effects, even though the vaccines are amazingly reducing the infection now in the USA and UK.
          Last month, Shionogi has announced that they planned to ship 30 million shots of their COVID 19 vaccines until the end of this year(*5). Last week, Novavax has proved that their developed vaccine is about 90 % effective to some of the variants.
          In my opinion, the spike protein vaccine is safer than the others. Especially the mRNA vaccine changes the human nuclear DNA so that that makes our muscle cells produce the virus protein. I feel a little bit scared of that. I prefer to get Shionogi’s or Novavax’s vaccine. Some researchers and medical doctors say that the spike protein vaccine will work as a booster shot when the variants spread and the mRNA vaccine’s efficiency declines.

Insects are one of the keys for the solutions of various issues

          There are more global issues: the extreme climates between too much rain and droughts, huge tropical storms, food shortage, water shortage, sea levels rising, etc.. It is also said that as long as the human beings keep on eating meat, the unfair distribution of food and water won’t stop. Recently the situations have gotten into the negative spiral. How soon the end of the pandemic will come also relies on the vaccines. We have to buy time with the vaccine in order to avoid hospital beds being full.
          Insects may be the important key for the solutions of the above-mentioned issues even if you hate them. So …… Reconcile yourself to insects.

REFERENCE
(*1)https://youtu.be/BpslE8E7XZY

(*2)https://www.npr.org/2021/05/18/997998920/the-fungus-thats-making-cicadas-sex-crazy
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-19813-0

(*3)https://snacksafely.com/2021/02/cricket-flour-mealworms-the-insects-are-coming-and-may-put-people-with-food-allergies-at-risk/

(*4)https://blog.gaijinpot.com/3-edible-japanese-insects-autumn/

(*5)https://www.wsj.com/articles/novavax-covid-19-vaccine-is-90-effective-in-key-study-11623664800