Post Date November, 17 2024
In the early days when AIDS was discovered, some tabloids would publish articles about whether mosquitoes could transmit AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, AIDS), so as to attract public attention and stimulate circulation. This topic started from a small community in southern Florida, because there are signs that mosquitoes may be related to the high incidence rate of AIDS in the local area.
The media immediately claimed that mosquitoes were related to AIDS infection. However, the scientific investigation by the National Center for Disease Control (CDC) at that time had proved that mosquitoes had nothing to do with AIDS infection. Nevertheless, the media has made many people feel that mosquitoes can infect AIDS.
Research results show that mosquitoes cannot transmit HIV
1. HIV is digested in mosquitoes
Pathogens must remain active during mosquito transmission in order to be transmitted between hosts. If mosquitoes digest the pathogen, the virus will not be transmitted to the next host. Usually, mosquito like infectious viruses have many ways to avoid decomposition. Some viruses have immunity to mosquito digestive enzymes. Most viruses quickly penetrate the mosquito's stomach to avoid being broken down by powerful digestive enzymes. Malaria pathogens can survive in the mosquito stomach for 9 to 12 days and complete necessary transformations during this process. Encephalitis pathogens have a incubation period of 10 to 25 days inside mosquitoes, during which they multiply and divide extensively. Research has proved that AIDS virus and blood are digested in mosquitoes. Therefore, mosquitoes will digest all pathogens within one or two days after ingesting HIV infected blood, and there will be no possibility of re infection. Since the virus can no longer reproduce and enter the mosquito's digestive gland, HIV cannot be transmitted from a single host. The theory that most mosquito parasites can transmit HIV in this way cannot prove that mosquitoes can transmit HIV.
2. Mosquitoes don't have enough HIV to infect every time they suck blood
The concentration of pathogens in the bloodstream is high enough to allow the virus to spread between different hosts, meaning there are enough pathogens to continue the infection. The minimum number of pathogens required for different infectious diseases varies. The level of HIV in the blood is lower than that of all known mosquito infectious diseases. Infected individuals with 10 units of virus in their blood are rare, with virus levels in the blood of 70% to 80% of infected individuals being negligible.
