Do mosquitos carry ebola?

[zappaman]

Do we even know?
Cuz that would not be cool.

[ProdigalJunkMail]

1. i don't see why not... n/t

[Daemonaquila]

8. Because it can't infect the mosquito itself, is why not.

People think that mosquitos pass on disease by somehow regurgitating blood back into a later victim. They don't. They only can pass on disease via their own saliva, and if they can't be infected by a certain disease (only mammals can catch ebola), the organism isn't present in their saliva to pass on.

[belzabubba333]

20. could the mosquito be like a dirty needle?

[ProdigalJunkMail]

36. I did not know that

thank you for the information... interesting!

sP

[Peacetrain]

2. Interesting.. don't know.. there are lots and lots of diseases that are not transmitted by

mosquito bites.. From measles to chickenpox.. the flu etc etc etc.. so my first instinct is probably not..

Edit to add...I gave your post a rec.. because it is a good question

[belzabubba333]

21. but there's malaria-

[kestrel91316]

3. No. It is absolutely not any sort of arthropod-borne disease.

I forget the actual explanation, but I heard a great discussion of tis over on This Week in Virology, one of the ebola segments.

http://www.twiv.tv/tag/ebola/

Vinnie Racaniello used to work for David Baltimore so he's got impeccable credentials. Baltimore and Temin discovered reverse transcriptase.

[scarystuffyo]

11. That study was if it can be transmited by a bite

[kestrel91316]

23. What study are you referencing?

If Ebola spread by mosquito bite, it would be as ubiquitous as malaria is in Africa.

It isn't. That is what's known as epidemiologic evidence.

[scarystuffyo]

24. I said it's not spread by a bite

but the blood inside the mosquito can be infected .

[kestrel91316]

34. I'm not aware of any studies showing mosquitos can harbor viable Ebola virus.

Got a link?

[scarystuffyo]

39. That's my point , it hasn't been done

All the studies are only looking at transmission by bite which is how a mosquito would transmit it.

But the blood is infected if it just feed on a victim suffering ebola

[Earth_First]

4. Ask CNN...

[Warpy]

5. No. The vectors are fruit bats and simian bush meat

They eat fruit bat in West Africa and I imagine it tastes great when you haven't had meat in a few months.

[Bluenorthwest]

6. Malaria is carried by mosquitos. 2012 in Africa 200 Million cases. 620,000 deaths.

It is preventable, curable and kills mostly children at a rate of about one per minute on the continent. Perspective and all that. 2012 in Africa, 1.2 million dead from AIDS, a virus Americans used to fear would be mutating to transmit via a quick glance or from the sound waves contained in disco music.....

[Daemonaquila]

7. No, they don't, and here's why.

This is something that they looked at pretty thoroughly. It turns out that you have to infect a mosquito for it to pass on a disease. Ebola only affects mammals, so no problem.

When you look at diseases like malaria, those get transmitted because the mosquito itself becomes sick. In the case of malaria, it's actually a parasite. It's passed on by the mosquito via its SALIVA, which is injected during the bite to prevent clotting. If the mosquito is not infected, there's nothing in the saliva to pass on.

The only, vanishingly small, possibility that a mosquito could get involved in ebola transmission would be if a mosquita had JUST eaten, and the blood had NOT been sufficiently digested, and it landed on someone else who SWATTED it, and the FRESH blood it had just eaten got into a cut or mucus membrane. But even so, a mosquito drinks at most 3 mg of blood. You'd need an incredibly high viral load to have much virus in that payload.

[roamer65]

9. No, but nurses under voluntary quarantine with symptoms on planes do spread it.

[Puzzledtraveller]

27. winner!

[scarystuffyo]

10. It's possible yes

[kestrel91316]

25. No, there is no evidence that it is even possible.

The virologists and epidemiologists have a pretty good handle on this fact, and why.

Where did you say you got your double PhDs in Epidemiology and Virology again?

[scarystuffyo]

29. If the blood is infected then it's still infected inside the mosquito

prove me wrong, bet you can't

[kestrel91316]

38. Presence of virus does not equate to viable virus capable of causing infection.

What are you? 14 years old???

It's not for ME to prove YOU wrong, dude. That isn't how these things work. You are saying mosquito-borne virus could pose a threat and I am asking you to cite the evidence because it's up to you to prove what you claim. You know? Peer-reviewed published studies documenting what you are claiming?

Do you even know what those are?

[scarystuffyo]

54. You're asking me to post a study that never has been done

That's the whole thing it was never a priority to fund research until now because frankly the people it was killing seemed not to matter.
That's disgusting ..

If this was a disease that was killing people in Europe and North America since 1976
I'm sure I could find the study to say one way or another.








he first human trials of a Canadian Ebola vaccine began Monday, part of a flood of experimental therapies rushed into testing to battle the Ebola epidemic.

Although the world has been fighting Ebola since 1976, major drugmakers showed little interest in the disease because outbreaks were small and sporadic, said Thomas Geisbert, a professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch, who has studied Ebola and tested drugs against it for many years.

Ebola research got a jump-start after the terrorist attacks in 2001 as the government funded studies to prepare for possible bioterror attacks, said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Only the current Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the biggest in history, has succeeded in moving experimental drugs and vaccines into larger clinical trials. There are no approved drugs or vaccines on the market, so several Ebola patients have received experimental medications.

Though some of these drugs are in short supply, experts say other approaches could be put to much greater use. Here's a summary of promising potential therapies




Ebola has never

[scarystuffyo]

55. When you say this how do you know?

"Presence of virus does not equate to viable virus capable of causing infection"

If the study has never been done , funded and researched

[Cal Carpenter]

28. According to whom?

[scarystuffyo]

30. It just consumed infected blood

Do you think the virus in the blood just changed inside the mosquito

It didn't

The question is how long the virus will live but it is present in the blood

[Cal Carpenter]

31. Wrong

But don't take my word for it.

Can the Ebola virus be transmitted by mosquitoes? If not, why not?

No, it cannot. Transmission by mosquito requires the ability of the virus or other organism to be adapted to this particular form of transmission, which means that it would be the right size, and survive in the mosquito gut. There are no cases of Ebola being transmitted by mosquitoes.

http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-10-15/heres-everything-you-wish-you-didnt-need-know-about-ebola

and


http://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/local/2014/08/05/things-know-ebola-virus/13650543/

and

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/local-news/20141012-survivors-susceptible-to-other-strains-of-disease.ece

and

http://ec.europa.eu/health/preparedness_response/docs/ebola_infotravellers2014_en.pdf

[scarystuffyo]

32. I said twice already it can't be transmitted by a bite

[Cal Carpenter]

41. Oh my god the scientists have NEVER THOUGHT OF THIS

You are probably right!!!111!

[scarystuffyo]

42. Link the study

[Cal Carpenter]

51. ...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5671809

[scarystuffyo]

35. Every study has been done studying the transmission by bite

[kestrel91316]

40. If you are postulating that a swatted mosquito's gut contents pose an infection risk,

either cite the published studies showing that it can happen or go to college, get your BS in Microbiology, then get your MS in Virology, then do your PhD dissertation on ruptured mosquito guts as possible fomites for transmission of Ebola.

You're not going to find out if it happens by blathering wildly about it on a political forum.

[scarystuffyo]

44. I told you , you wouldn't be able to prove it wrong

Every study has been to determine if it can be transmitted by a bite only


They never said in any study the virus wasn't alive in the blood of the mosquito .

They said it can't be transmitted by the insect if it bites a person.

That's why they did the research because they know the blood is infected after it bites a person suffering from ebola.

[Renew Deal]

49. "PhD dissertation on ruptured mosquito guts"

[upaloopa]

12. Only if they vomit on you

[zappaman]

13. Flies vomit on you.

Can flies carry ebola in their vomit?

[scarystuffyo]

14. Every study said that it can't be

transmitted by a bite but have you ever slapped a mosquito on your arm or leg?

If it's been feeding what do you see on your skin?

[zappaman]

15. BLOOD!!!!

[scarystuffyo]

16. Yup

The blood inside the mosquito is infected , it's that it can't pass it on by biting someone.

[Crunchy Frog]

48. It's always been my own blood when that's happened.

Do you suppose I could give Ebola to myself?

[In_The_Wind]

17. Thanks

another thing to worry about at 3AM.

[Renew Deal]

50. Hillary is ready for that 3AM phone call

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. It doesn't look like it, since it has only spread by contact in Africa

Africa has many diseases that do spread by insect bite, but Ebola has not - they've always been able to show it was direct contact with a sufferer.

[deaniac21]

19. The CDC says

you have to take a bath in victims vomit before you can catch it.

[zappaman]

22. Really?

Gonna have to cancel my weekend plans...

[uppityperson]

26. Only if it is bleeding out of every orifice of its body with liquified organs.

In reality, word I read last week from the science experts was no.

[SheilaT]

33. Oh, jeez.

If mosquitoes carried Ebola and could pass it on, it would absolutely be, as someone else has already pointed out, at least as common as malaria.

Before asking questions like that on a forum like this, read up on epidemiology and such. Two books I can highly recommend, both by Laurie Garrett are The Coming Plague, which is about emerging diseases, and Betrayal of Trust, which is about how public health everywhere has been gutted.

Each one is a good 800 pages, so they will keep you occupied for a while.

Laurie Garrett continues to report on these topics, and here's a link to a piece that appeared today in the Omaha World Herald. http://www.omaha.com/opinion/laurie-garrett-separating-ebola-facts-from-fiction/article_094afc09-e9c8-5bb5-a027-f1819c4e0920.html

to sum it up, she says Ebola is very serious, needs to be taken seriously, but going into the realm of science-fiction like speculation isn't useful.

[bravenak]

37. I was thinking the same shit.

My mother said it would be jesus, I thought it would be aliens, but my fucking sister was right again. She warned me to my zombie appocalypse ideas made into money.... I shoulda listened..

[zappaman]

43. You could both be right.

It could be a virus that is alien!

BTW, I remember being in the front row of a comedy club for Paul Mooney around 1987.
Damn, that guy was funny! Still is.

[bravenak]

45. I just wish we could have saved ourselves from ourselves.

But, Paul For Prez. 2016. If we are still here and shit.

[titaniumsalute]

46. Mosquitos did not transmit HIV NT

[Crunchy Frog]

47. I very much doubt it.

If they did, the infection pattern would resemble that of malaria, which it does not.

[closeupready]

52. Look at infection patterns, as with HIV or any other emergent disease.

Likely not. Ebola is not a new disease - it's been around, and it has been studied, and who gets infected, and in Africa, it's not a mosquito-driven infection, unlike malaria.