How Risky Are Mosquito Bites?
A mosquito bite can mean much more than a few days of itching. For some people, they can cause severe allergic reactions. Plus, there are mosquito-transmitted illnesses. The West Nile virus made its first appearance in the U.S. in 1999. That year, New York confirmed 62 cases and seven deaths. By 2008, the number of cases had escalated substantially. In 2008 alone, the CDC reported 1,356 cases of West Nile throughout the U.S. and 44 deaths. Then there’s malaria, an oft-forgotten mosquito-transmitted disease. “We don’t think about it, but a million people worldwide die of malaria every year,” Baumann says. Although malaria outbreaks in the U.S. are few and far between, the same can’t be said for West Nile, which Conlon says “is probably here to stay.” And with it, the age-old, ever-adaptable mosquito.
