Boro Nut

Your missing the point Scigirl. There is every possibility that HIV is indeed transmitted by mosquitoes.

1 - AIDS shortens your life.
2 - Mosquitoes only live a short time anyway.

I seems reasonable to assume if they are riddled with AIDS they have only got about 5 minutes after leaving the pond before they have to bite somebody, hence the low transmission rate.

theyeti

Right, most people don't realize that malaria does not passively ride in the mosquitoe's gut. Instead it infects the moquitoe's lumen cells where it undergoes sexual reproduction. In fact, since the parasite does it's sexual phase in the mosquitoe, the mosquitoe is known as the definitive host, whereas we are only the intermediate host. It may offend our anthrocentric sensibilities, but the most important parts of the malarial lifecycle take place in the mosquitoe. The infectious parasites then travel to the mosquitoe's salivary glands where it has to puke them up before it can suck blood; thereby the parasites make sure that they'll enter a human (or other animal) host. There's no way that HIV could have this or any similar mechanism.

theyeti

hammegk

Could not? Well, doesn't seem to yet anyhoo.

In the late 80's a study was done in Belle Glade FL looking at the possibility of a mosquito vector. As studies go it didn't have a large group to work with... a few hundred people maybe.

That vector was ruled out, although that had to include undisclosed sex and/or IV drug abuse for kids as young as 10 as I recall.

I believe the conclusion was 0-9 year olds w/ HIV had an HIV pos mom, although there may have been an intermediate age that was all HIV neg.

There was an implication a few years ago that a 20 yr lag was possible from time of infection to an HIV pos test. Any new info on this?

scigirl

Are you teasing? Or are you serious?

Mosquitoes cannot get AIDS, in the same way that they can't get diabetes! They have neither an immune system nor a pancreas. AIDS, i.e Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, is a much-delayed side effect of HIV infection, and requires that the patient have an immune system!

Mosquitoes cannot get HIV infection either. HIV needs a very specific type of human cell to even replicate. Even if mosquitoes had this type of cell (which they don't), I think the replication cycle of HIV requires a longer amount of time than the mosquito's life span.

So no Boro Nut, I am not missing the point.

What is the point? Do mosquitoes serve as a viable vector for harboring and spreading HIV particles? The answer is no, <a href="http://www.sfaf.org/aids101/transmission.html#insects" target="_blank">for several reasons</a>:
I am adding a third reason:

3) HIV, like all infectious disease, has a 'minimum effective dose.' It is unlikely that a mosquito would get enough viruses from the "donor" with the amount of blood it is drawing. Subsequently, out of the particles it DID get, it is unlikely still that enough of them would survive the harsh conditions. Furthermore, out of these particles that do survive the harsh conditions, it is even more unlikely that they make it back from the gut into the mosquito's mouth and into another victim.

I hope that made sense.

Can someone close this thread now? I think several of us have answered it suffiently!

Dr. Scigirl

Edited to add,

I wasn't trying to pick on you, Boro! It's just that it upsets me to see a disease such as AIDS so incredibly mis-understood by so many people. It is the second-largest infectious disease killer in the world, yet reasonably educated people still don't have all the facts, thanks to a few paranoid fanatics and a large amount of mis-information and fabrications (like the ones in the original post in this thread). We need to eradicate ignorance before we can eradicate HIV!

[/soap box rant]

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: scigirl ]</p>

Oolon Colluphid

Dear oh dear, scigirl. You should know by now the rule of thumb: If it's posted by Boro, assume it ain't serious till shown otherwise .

( @ Boro Nut)

TTFN, Oolon

Boro Nut

I accept that I am no expert, but there is a lot about AIDS that we are not told. For instance, I clearly recall watching Sarah Palmer-Tomkinson riding for GB in the dressage at the Atlanta Olympics, and the commentator saying that she was giving AIDS to the horse. I rewound the tape and couldn't actually see this myself, so maybe he meant it in the sense that she was doing it in the comfort of her own horsebox, around that general period in time.

She never sued for slander, so you can infer yourself whether this allegation had any validity. I don't recall the horses name, but I do know it was dead within five years.

Dr Rick

Insect-vector borne illnesses such as malaria and Yellow fever display an epidemiologic pattern that is distinctly different from contagions with no known animal reservoir or vector such as Hepatitis B.

There are millions of HIV infected people in parts of Africa and there are also many mosquitos; if the latter were significant HIV vectors than the pattern of human infection would be much different than the one reported by the World Health Organization

[ February 08, 2002: Message edited by: rbochnermd ]</p>