En Español No. From the start of the HIV epidemic there has been concern about HIV transmission
from biting and bloodsucking insects, such as mosquitoes. However, studies
conducted by the CDC and elsewhere have shown no evidence of HIV transmission
from mosquitoes or any other insects - even in areas where there are many cases
of AIDS and large populations of mosquitoes. Lack of such outbreaks, despite
intense efforts to detect them, supports the conclusion that HIV is not transmitted
by insects.
The results of experiments and observations of insect biting behavior
indicate that when an insect bites a person, it does not inject its own or
a previously
bitten person's or animal's blood into the next person bitten. Rather, it injects
saliva, which acts as a lubricant so the insect can feed efficiently. Diseases
such as yellow fever and malaria are transmitted through the saliva of specific
species of mosquitoes. However, HIV lives for only a short time inside an insect
and, unlike organisms that are transmitted via insect bites, HIV does not reproduce
(and does not survive) in insects. Thus, even if the virus enters a mosquito
or another insect, the insect does not become infected and cannot transmit
HIV to the next human it bites.
There also is no reason to fear that a mosquito
or other insect could transmit HIV from one person to another through HIV-infected
blood left on its mouth
parts. Several reasons help explain why this is so. First, infected people
do not have
constantly high levels of HIV in their blood streams. Second, insect mouth
parts retain only very small amounts of blood on their surfaces. Finally,
scientists who study insects have determined that biting insects normally do
not travel
from one person to the next immediately after ingesting blood. Rather, they
fly
to a resting place to digest the blood meal. |