Transcript:
Summer is here! Have you ever been outside during a warm summer evening and been bitten alive by mosquitos? Almost immediately after, you get a red itchy pelt. Have you wondered why mosquito bites itch? Have you also noticed that several days later, the itch persists? For a mosquito bite to really cause a reaction on your skin, a female mosquito must feed for at least 6 seconds. It is an interesting fact that only female mosquitoes require blood to obtain nutrients to produce eggs. While the mosquito is extracting your blood, it also injects into the tissue, a mixture of chemicals that prevents blood from clotting as well as helping the mosquito to avoid detection. These chemicals cause an immune reaction leading to the classic redness, swelling, and itching.
The itching is your body responding to the foreign substances that enter your body. It acts as an army to eradicate the chemicals the mosquito secreted. While we consider the itchiness to be an annoyance, it is your body getting rid of unwanted chemicals. To dive a little deeper, the very first time you get bitten by a mosquito, your body does not produce a reaction because it does not yet recognize these foreign objects, or antigens, but the second time, your body is ready and immediately reacts, similar to firemen responding to an alarm call. Your body will release immunoglobulins, also called antibodies that will interact with the antigens and also release chemicals such as histamine and other pro-defense particles. Histamine is part of the allergic response and is associated with itching. However, new research suggests that your brain plays a role as well. Immune cells will release other unknown substances that will interact with nearby neurons to send signals to your brain telling you your bite itches. This response can last several days and thus explains why mosquito bite still itches 1 or 2 days later until your immune system stops releasing chemicals to fight off the foreign substances.
Many of us have said we need to just get rid of all mosquitos, after all they are a pest and transmit dangerous diseases. However, eradicating all mosquitoes seems like an easy answer, but it will affect the ecosystem. We also have to remember that when we remove one species, another one will replace it. Predicting what will replace it is a guessing game and could be a species that is even worse than mosquitos. Not to mention, mosquitos have been around for 400 millions years due to their ability to quickly adapting to changing situations so truly eradicating all 3500+ species of mosquitoes is an impossible task. It is also interesting to note that only 6% of all species will draw blood from human and of those 6%, only about 100 mosquito species can transmit diseases.
