Human Insulin Suppresses Mosquito Immune System

[Northerner]

Human insulin suppresses the mosquito immune system, according to a paper in the June issue of the ournal Infection and Immunity. And while mosquitoes and malaria might seem to go together like baseball and hotdogs, mosquitoes' immunological resistance to the malaria parasite actually slows its spread among H. sapiens.

"A fair portion actually fight off the infection," says first author Nazzy Pakpour of the University of California, Davis.

But now the rate of type 2 diabetes is climbing in Africa as in most of the rest of the world, to the point where by 2030, one in five adults there are predicted to be so-afflicted. More diabetes means more hyperinsulinemia?more human insulin to inhibit mosquitoes' immune response to Plasmodium falciparum, thus aiding and abetting transmission of this dread disease.

http://www.infectioncontroltoday.co...nsulin-suppresses-mosquito-immune-system.aspx

 

[Vicsetter]

Can mosquitos detect high glucose. They bite to provide food for their young so I would presume they prefer sweet blood. Perhaps why some people don't seem to get bitten by midges in Scotland, whilst others do.

 

[trophywench]

I've always wondered that Vicsetter, they eat me alive at any slight opportunity they get.