Mosquito extinction would ripple through ecosystems in multiple, interconnected ways, with both potential benefits and substantial ecological costs. Below is a concise, evidence-informed overview of likely outcomes, along with key uncertainties. Direct human-health impacts

• Benefit: Significant reduction or near-elimination of diseases transmitted by mosquitoes (e.g., malaria, dengue, Zika, yellow fever) would dramatically decrease human morbidity and mortality in affected regions. This would also free up resources currently spent on vector control and disease treatment.

• Caveat: The global health impact depends on whether all vector species are eliminated or only certain ones, and on how quickly human societies adapt to any ecological changes that follow.

Ecological and food-web consequences

• Predator-prey dynamics: Mosquitoes serve as food for a variety of aquatic and terrestrial species (fish like mosquitofish, amphibians, birds, bats, etc.). Their sudden loss would reduce prey availability for these predators, potentially causing declines or forcing dietary shifts that could cascade through ecosystems.

• Cross-ecosystem flux: Mosquito larvae occupy aquatic habitats and emergence flux provides a biomass pulse to terrestrial predators. Removing this input could alter energy flow and predator foraging strategies across habitat boundaries.

• Pollination: Adult mosquitoes contribute to nectar feeding and can act as pollinators for certain plant species. Their absence could reduce nectar-based pollination services for those plants, potentially affecting plant reproduction and community composition in some ecosystems.

• Potential for compensatory shifts: Other insects (e.g., midges, other dipterans) and pollinators might fill some ecological roles left vacant by mosquitoes, mitigating some impacts but not necessarily restoring exact prior relationships or timing (e.g., seasonal emergence, spatial feeding patterns).

Biodiversity and ecosystem services

• Biodiversity effects: The loss of a highly abundant and widespread group could alter community structure, with variable outcomes across regions. Some ecosystems may experience more pronounced trophic cascades, while others adapt with less dramatic disruption.

• Disease ecology and unintended consequences: Reduced disease pressure could alter human-wildlife interactions and land-use patterns, potentially influencing conservation priorities and ecosystem services (like pollination and food resources for wildlife) indirectly.

Agricultural and economic implications

• Crop and forest impacts: Pollination changes and shifts in pest dynamics could affect crop yields and forest health in certain areas, though these effects are context-dependent and may be partially offset by alternative pollinators and pest-control dynamics.

Key uncertainties and considerations

• Keystone status: Mosquitoes are not universally regarded as keystone species, but their ecological roles are diverse and context-specific. The magnitude of disruption would depend on which ecosystems are most reliant on mosquitoes for food or pollination in a given region.

• Replacement by other species: In many cases, other insects or arthropods could occupy similar ecological niches, potentially dampening some impacts through compensatory dynamics, though not necessarily matching exact timing or species-specific interactions.

• Evolutionary and climate contexts: Changes in climate, habitat fragmentation, and human land use could amplify or dampen effects, making predictions highly region-specific.

If you’d like, I can tailor this to a particular region or ecosystem (e.g., Amazonian rainforest, African savannas, Arctic ecosystems) and highlight the most probable cascading effects and data sources for that context.