The Mosquite - A Human History of our Deadliest Predator
This day in history: Ronald Ross found the presence of malaria inside a mosquito on this day (August 20) in 1897. Because of this he received the Nobel Prize in Medicine “for his work on malaria, by which he has shown how it enters the organism and thereby has laid the foundation for successful research on this disease and methods of combating it.”
World Mosquito Day is held on August 20 to commemorate this discovery.
To this day, even with mitigation efforts, the mosquito is the world's deadliest animal...killing over 1 million people per year. Mosquitoes also spread yellow fever, dengue fever, chikungunya, Lymphatic filariasis (the main cause of elephantiasis), West Nile virus, Equine encephalitis viruses, Tularemia, a bacterial disease caused by Francisella tularensis, Zika viruses, St. Louis Encephalitis, Heartworm disease and possible HIV.
It is only the female mosquito that transmits disease, and like vampires they do this from dusk til dawn. According to the American Mosquito Control Association, there are over 3,000 different species of mosquitoes throughout the world. West Virginia has the fewest species with only 26. There are about 60 different species of mosquito in Ohio. Texas has the most with 85, and Florida has 80.
Studies have revealed that mosquitoes are able to drink 3 times their own body weight in blood. Female mosquitoes can lay up to 300 eggs at a time. The average mosquito lives less than two months.
"They are drawn to humans by their breath. Receptors on their antennae detect the carbon dioxide released when we exhale. Anyone who breathes more, including larger people and pregnant women, may be more attractive."~Karen Farkas
Mosquitoes are also attracted to people drinking beer.
"Mosquitoes are as old as the Dinosaurs, with evidence of these biting insects dating back to the Triassic Period! If you’ve seen the film Jurassic Park, this comes as no surprise as you’ll recall they used the blood found in fossilized mosquitoes to clone the infamous creatures to fill the park."~Ashley Smith
The CDC (Centers for Disease Control) was formed to fight malaria, something that wasn't eradicated from the US until 1951. DDT was primarily used to fight malaria, but environmentalists got DDT banned and as a result many die unnecessarily. DDT was the safest, cheapest, and most effective tool against Malaria. The banning of DDT is one of the greatest tragedies of the past century. "Since the mid-1970s, when DDT was eliminated from global eradication efforts, tens of millions of people have died from malaria unnecessarily: most have been children less than five years old." ~Paul A. Offitmosq
Eight presidents have had malaria: George Washington, James Monroe, Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, James A. Garfield, Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. Four popes have died from malaria.
On an interesting side-note: George Herbert, the 5th Earl of Carnarvon, who financed Howard Carter's search for King Tutankhamun, died after a mosquito bite, which he had cut while shaving and became infected. Some attributed his death to the so-called curse of the pharaohs.
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