The Mosquito

To fulfill a future career in Mosquitoes-Catching the jungles of Indonesia, the swamp marshes of Papua New Guinea or the rivers and flat lands on Louisiana might be a good start. On the Fly River in PNG all that has to be done to catch ten or more "Mosies" on one fell swoop is to wear a pair of shorts and be outside, then after a suitable interval has passed move the hand down in a rapid movement against the thigh or leg. Upon inspection ten or more squashed and mangled ex-drillers, surrounded in pools of your blood will be lying in the palm.

Sadly this method although practiced often seems to have no effect on the actual numbers still flying around and within macro-seconds of murdering ten or more of them another family will have arrived, set up their legs in the drilling stance and will be busy sucking out your juice for all they are worth.

Researchers have estimated that mosquitoes in northern Canada can reach densities of 12 million adult mosquitoes per hectare. In the name of science, one researcher in northern Canada offered up his bare forearm to see just how many mosquitos would attack it at once. At the measured rate of 280 forearm bites per minute it is estimated that an adult male could lose half his blood in less than two hours

THE MOSQUITOE
A little warm-climate beast of terror that drives people to extremes! Any self-respecting human would rather face the terrors of a lion than be tortured by the buzzing beasts.

There are hundreds of different types of Mosquitoes found in different areas of the world. Three main classifications exist and these relate to the breeding and lifestyles that they prefer.

Aedes: Typically called floodwater mosies as they prefer to lay their eggs singly on damp soil patches. The eggs will lie dormant until the water level rises. The Asian Tiger Mosie is a member of this group and is known as a disease carrier.

Culex: These type like to lay long rafts of eggs of 100 or more potential children in stagnant or preferably well polluted and long standing water – containers left lying around, plant pots saucers, fishing ponds, gutters, et al.

Anopholes: These type also lay long rafts of eggs but in preference to the large cities they prefer large bodies of fresh water that are suffused with aquatic plant life – swamps and marshes in other words.

These grouping are basic and do not cover all known types but what is well documented is that the female lays the eggs and it is for this purpose that blood is required. The male does not drink blood, does not have vampire tendencies and exists happily on a mixture of plant nectar and rubbish. The male mosquito is thus harmless to humans.

THE ANNOYANCES
Mosquitoes typically like to start feeding just after dark and just before sunrise and between times they will be found resting in dark, damp and miserable hideaways. It is at 5am when they come out to play, to annoy and feed on all the helpless humans that are awaiting their pleasures. It is at 5am that loads of humans awake suddenly, with little lumps itching away, and in a panic.

One mosquito can eat and bite three four of five times. It can vary position from a leg to an arm, the neck to the toe. It will do this for over an hour and until a distraught and very irritable human is forced out of bed and into a Mosie catching mode.

This dusk and dawn feature does not apply to all mosquitoes and should one be hungry at any time of day they will attack regardless of whom, when or where the victim will be.

Another very annoying feature of the mosquito, apart from the incredibly annoying itchiness as the body tries to dilute and rid the body of the injected chemicals, is the buzzing noise that they make. The high pitched sound that is produced by the wing beats is very disturbing when it sounds next to the ear and none-more-so than when the owner is lost in a book or dozing off. The result of hearing this high pitched buzzing sound typically causes a human to jump up in extreme panic and to wave his/her arms hysterically above their heads whilst jumping around on one foot and shouting "********". This action only tends to send the mosquito to a safe waiting area and the panicked human to be observed suspiciously by others in the room or vicinity.

KILLING TIME
When that buzzing noise panics potential victims and when itchiness levels rise to new heights the usual response is a very basic one. The main aim of any victim, potential or otherwise is to crush, destroy and squash the offender with any means, utensil or limb available. Normally quiet humans suddenly turn into vicious killing machines with a certain madness or overriding force prevalent.

This sudden rise of pure aggression and viscous slamming around of rolled up newspapers and saucepans can turn to premeditated murder.

Victims who wake up to the sounds of this high pitched buzzing or who wake up with an incredibly itchiness and scratching problem will initially wave their arms around their heads like windmills, toss and throw covers around like a typhoon and jump around the bedroom frightening partners and neighbors in the heat of the moment. This burst of activity will in-time turn into a cold-blooded killing machine like hunt for the mosquito. Normal humans will become very deliberate; will sit for hours with cans of fly spray, with weapons and protective devices – waiting for that mosquito to return – or they might turn over and search that room like a drug squad on high alert.

A hungry Mosie flies fast and is very responsive to potential attack and it is thus quite hard to kill. But a mosquito that has just filled itself up with goodness is heavy and potbellied and it has trouble getting off to a flying start. This is a good time to get them: they are slow, burdened and not very responsive. Ofcourse the timing is not perfect as the blood has already been drawn but certainty is improved with the fact that this mosquito will be going down and will not be biting again.

Another point at which the mosquito becomes vulnerable is just at the point of positioning. It locks its legs around the drilling platform and is just about to break skin when it becomes totally oblivious to the world around it. This is an excellent time to kill as it is before any blood is drawn but it does require the potential victim to be aware of the landing having occurred.

WEAPONS OF CHOICE
It is preferable to kill these annoying facts of life before they become a problem, before they get hungry and before dusk sets in.

Many houses the world over have mosquitoes nets permanently covering every window and aperture possible. This does prevent them entering the house through open windows and reduces considerably the threat they make to occupants. Unfortunately, however tight or sealed the house is one or two always seem to escape the net, either through doors as people enter, holes in netting that are not visible or through drains, vents etc that have escaped notice. They manage to enter and on average one victim will fall prey to a mosquito every night.

Mosquito netting is also used around beds where the houses themselves remain unsealed and open to the elements. These nets if looked after and positioned carefully do work well but it must be noted that should one mosquito get inside it is very hard for it to get out – and it might be hungry!

Air conditioning is a good a way as any to stop mosquitoes entering a house or a bedroom. They hate the cold weather and like to keep well away from it. Winding down the temperature to 5 degrees is not necessary, a simple 24 or 25 will ensure the absence of any flying beasts for the night.

DDT-spraying campaigns were used to stifle the mosquitoes carrying malaria, But DDT played havoc with the environment -- it killed birds and beneficial insects as well as anopheles mosquitoes. And the mosquitoes eventually gained resistance to DDT, and then to newer insecticides.

Mosquitoes are very responsive to smell and to infra-red light. Smoke coils that burn slowly throughout the night do work wonders and the mosquitoes tend to keep well clear of the area. Here though problems exist with coils often extinguishing themselves before dawn thus clearing the way for mosquitoes to enter. Infra red light lamps do work well, with the insects being drawn towards the light then being zapped by an electric wire mesh. It is though not something that many people would like to fall asleep with -: a lamp that shines pink and a frying pan sizzling sound that goes off every time a mosquito gets drawn in, plus of course the burning smell that follows. These contraptions are also ignored by blood hungry mosquitoes that put humans first and lamps second and one Canadian Scientist suggests that these devices catch only moths and bugs and maybe 3 out of one hundred mosquitoes.

Soaps and body creams, insect repellants and horrible smelling sprays are not really life’s answer to the problem even though many doctors and chemists would like to suggest. Covering the body from head to toe in a chemical, day in day out is not a nice thought and it must be remembered that many of them have been known to cause side effects like skin rashes and in some cases cancer. It is also not possible to cover all of the body and mosquitoes have ways of finding bare patches quicker than humans can.

PEST CONTROL
In preference to running a constant defensive action against them, trying to keep them at bay by using protective devices it is possible to reduce or eliminate mosquitoes from actually living and breeding.

This does require greater emphasis on the problem than one human can do, it requires governmental departments to take an interest and for a nationwide attack to be implemented.

From a simple point of view all mosquitoes need standing water and should this standing water be eliminated or controlled then the reproduction cycle will be disturbed and even halted. By individual houses ensuring that no containers are left standing, that gutters are regularly cleaned and that fish ponds are well looked after will ensure that individual houses are not breeding centers. Governments can unsure that businesses follow the same control methods; that they take responsibility for the land they use/own. And governments can use other methods such as increasing stocks of larvae eating fish into mosquito areas, by spraying areas infested, and by control through other means they have at their disposal.

The idea should not be to eliminate them but to control them, not to destroy but live in harmony. Certainly this does not sound like a harmonic existence but to try to eliminate the species is practically impossible, too time consuming and costly. The idea is therefore to reduce there existence to survival status and to the marshes or waste lands where they belong, to keep them out of populated areas and away from travelers and tourists who cannot accept them.

The methods of some researchers to control them by generic alteration, by chemical spreads through species and by means that in effect are inhuman, tend to control by causing an imbalance in nature. These methods are many and well tried but none have managed to control the hordes more so than the simple removal of stagnant water.

THE DISEASES
The idea of mosquitoes only tormenting humans through buzzing sounds and itchiness is well below their full potential. Mosquitoes are well known for their disease carrying and spreading ability.

They are known as carriers of Malaria where it remains a tropical disease, and it's most severe in Africa, where it kills 2 million people each year, either directly or with some help from acute respiratory infections. Most of the dead are children.

There is also Dengue fever, a viral infection that's found in 100 countries and causes half-a-million hospitalizations and thousands of deaths each year. No vaccination has yet been found for this disease.

From an American Point of view: West Nile virus (WNV) is a potentially serious illness. Experts believe WNV is established as a seasonal epidemic in North America that flares up in the summer and continues into the fall. WNV affects the central nervous system. Symptoms vary. There is no specific treatment for WNV infection.

THE DRUGS
The best way to reduce the possibility of catching any disease is to not get bitten by a mosquito. Governments initially tried to prevent mosquitoes attacking by suggesting that large quantities of spray were used on a person’s body. This resulted in thousands of tourists traveling the world reeking with weird smells and oils, oblivious to the damage that it was causing to them and to the environment.

DEET: The following was extracted from the official Deet website: Biting insects can be more than annoying; they can sometimes be deadly. DEET, the active ingredient in most tick and insect repellents, is unequalled when it comes to keeping mosquitoes, ticks, and other bugs away. DEET is used safely by an estimated 200 million people each year.

When liberally spraying this product on the body it is also normal for protection against the sun to be used. New research, however, indicates that mixing the two could be dangerous. A scientist from Winnipeg who's been studying the issue for two years has found that insect repellent containing DEET and sunscreen don't mix. In fact the chemicals together can cause side effects such as dizziness, seizures and drops in blood pressure.

Other literature on the subject suggests that DEET should be used sparingly on children and that hands and face should be washed once back inside doors. This does indicate a problem and the mere fact that DEET is a chemical does suggest that it is not something that should be used for the long term. It is though the most widely used insect repellant and if used it must be done so in accordance with the instructions on the bottle or spray container. Visit the Duke Medical Institute in Durham or their website if it is too far away for more information on the negative effects of DEET and sprays available on the market today.

Clive Shiff, a malaria expert at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, was part of a project that sold treated nets to parents of 20,000 children in Tanzania. This project was an attempt to remove the mass spraying of humans to the mass spraying of stuff around them but with the victims getting bitten first. Shiff says: the engorged insect (a polite term for a bug that's too heavy with human blood to move) needs a place to rest to digest its nutritious repast. If that resting place happens to be an insecticide-treated net, it can become the bloodsucker's final resting place. This project was designed to reduce malaria spread and in effect is a cheap method of control that never seemed to have taken off effectively.

Anti Malarial Drugs There are a handful of drugs used against malaria. They all work (or don't work) by destroying the parasite in its earliest stages - at the time of infection. But since the parasites keep mutating, none of them provides 100% protection.

Doxcycline, an antibiotic, has to be taken every day. It is quite effective, cheap and has minimal side effects.

Mefloquine, or Lariam is the most popular and is said to be effective, but causes noticeable side effects in 25% of the people who take it. Many travelers who have taken this drug complain that it causes anxiety attacks and wicked nightmares.

Chloroquine is an anti-malarial which is no longer effective in Asia except the Philippines.

Malarone is a new one, so the jury is still out, but the manufacturer's website, not surprisingly, makes it sound wonderful. You take it once a day and it costs a pile. In basis: A new-found chemical that can root out malaria parasites hiding in red blood cells and stop them reproducing. This current chemical currently comes in the form of an injection but might soon be available in pill form.

Other pills are available but again they tend to rely on the ingestion of a chemical that may cause unwanted side-effects. Once again any pill must be taken as per the manufacturers or doctors instruction.

In preference to the drugs and sprays an original method of cure and prevention is that of a stiff gin and tonic. Tonic water is actually just plain old soda water with quinine added. Quinine is simply the best thing to take when you're being treated for malaria, which is why the Brits drank the stuff by the gallon in India in the 1800's, mixed of course with a modicum of gin to make the experience more palatable and of course more convivial.

Quinine is a white powder that is obtained from the bark of the cinchona tree that is found in the Andes mountain range of Ecuador and Peru. They were probably discovered by Peruvian Jesuits, who introduced quinine into Europe around 1640. However the destruction of these trees to obtain quinine made them rare and so a way of making it synthetically was sought. This was found in 1944 by Robert Woodward and William Doering by synthesizing quinine from coal tar. Today quinine is still found in tonic water although not enough to have any effect against malaria cure or prevention – unless enormously large quantities were to be drunk, every day and every night.

IN SUMMARY
It is far better for the spread of disease to be reduced through successful control and elimination of the threat than to apply constant defensive measures to the body. The little things in life that one can do to prevent mosquitoes biting can be far more effective than the constant spraying and ingestion/injection of chemicals and drugs that may produce side-effects that can be more hazardous than the simple bite of one mosquito.

The wearing of long sleeved clothes can reduce the bare skin available, strong breezes or a fan blowing over the body helps as does mosquito netting. Falling asleep next to a swamp or marsh is just plain stupidity as is taking long walks in the evening through jungles whilst wearing a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. A bat house would not go amiss as bats can gobble up thousands of the little nuisances every hour. House martins also like a good chomp on them. Don’t go out after dark and during mosquito meal times, go out during the day when they are too afraid to appear for fear of drying out.

Simple measures like closing doors, using smoke coils and zappers, fitting screens and removing containers holding stagnant water; all help to reduce the threat. Air conditioning units and fresh air, sunlight and strong winds, gloves and low body temperatures all help.

Some methods may be impracticable, especially for the hill walker, intrepid explorer or safari enthusiast but in all cases it is wise to look for the simple and effective measures to reduce the threat of attack rather than spraying chemicals and imbibing drugs in a last ditch effort.

There is of course the minor option of drinking at least five gallons of tonic water every day, mixed liberally with gin or vodka. The chances of not catching malaria and of being cured are not greatly enhanced but there will be a certain levity that will lighten the situation as you suffer.