- The ARC - California Edition -

The Mosquito

The mosquito is a very important insect pest since it has the potential of being the disease-carrier for many illnesses found in mammals, reptiles, and even amphibians. Mosquitoes are aggressive biters, serious nuisances, as well as carriers of infectious diseases that can leave the victim dead or severely damaged.

All varieties of mosquitoes need water in which to lay their eggs and grow from larva to adult. The male species of the mosquito generally gets all the nutrition it needs from plant juices, but the female mosquito has to consume a meal of blood before it can develop viable eggs. This animal blood meal is used as nourishment for those developing eggs.

Wild or domestic animals are frequent sources for their meals. Wild birds, like sparrows, finches, jays, robins, doves and pigeons, are considered the regular mosquito victims. But, many mosquitoes are strongly attracted to humans, and a few even take advantage of human activity.

When a female mosquito first comes into adulthood, it is probably almost disease-free, however, as the female proceeds through her reproductive cycle and starts obtaining blood from mammals or other hosts, it probably will pick up a virus of some sort or another.

This virus will grow and multiple, and soon become lodged in the mosquitoes salivary glands. During a subsequent feeding, this infected mosquito will inject its flexible snout into some unsuspecting host, and a virus transfer will occur. That host, which may receive this disease-causing virus, might be you.

Mosquitoes are able to transmit a number of well known communicable diseases. Yellow fever, malaria, dengue, dengue hemorrhagic fever, and filariasis (round worm) immediately come to mind. This information is nice to know, but most of these diseases are seldomly found in the state of California. In the few cases which are found here, epidemiologists (the people that study this type of information) eventually ascertain that the original source of almost every specific case started somewhere outside the United States.

Viral encephalitides – Aha ha! Encephalitis can cause an inflammation of the human brain and spinal cord. Sometimes this disease permanently damages a persons brain or central nervous system, and sometimes it is even fatal.

There are three varieties of encephalitis known to be carried by California mosquitoes — mosquitoes which had been born and bred right here in the state of California. The only way that humans are known to contract viral encephalitis is through the bite of an infected mosquito. Person-to-person, or bird-to-person transmission of encephalitis is unknown.

Prevention strategies — There are no preventive vaccines for man, so adequate disease-carrier control is the only front-line defense against these viruses. These controls are:

Reduce the number of infected mosquitoes,

Reduce the number of infected birds which is where the mosquitoes get the disease,

Reduce the accessibility of mammal hosts (including humans) to the infected mosquitoes.