Soldiers in protective equipment spraying plumes of disinfectant into the air. Drones roaring overhead. Quarantine-style measures creeping back into daily life.

Across China, the battle against the mosquito-borne Chikungunya virus is an unsettling deja vu of the Covid-19 pandemic.

This time – alongside human intervention – a force of ‘elephant mosquitos’ is also being rolled out to prevent a repeat of an epidemic that swept the globe two decades ago.

So far, more than 7,000 people have been infected, a few weeks after the World Health Organization issued an urgent call for action.

What is the Chikungunya virus?

Chikungunya, for which there is no specific treatment and which is spread primarily by Aedes mosquito species, including the ‘tiger mosquito’ which also transmits dengue, and Z

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