How to Fend Off Mosquitoes This Summer
Advice on protecting yourself from one of summer's peskiest pests.
By Neha Vyas, M.D., Contributor June 20, 2018, at 6:00 a.m.
U.S. News & World Report
Different strains of mosquitoes can bite at different times of day.Dan Salaman/London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
You wake up to a beautiful summer morning, the sun is shining and you're ready to enjoy some time outdoors. You make sure to put on your sunscreen and walk outside. A few seconds later, you feel a sting on your neck and reach up – only to find a mosquito has made a delicious breakfast of you. Ahh, the often-forgotten discomfort of summer-mosquito bites.
It seems like there are always alerts, whether from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or passed along by the media, about diseases that mosquitoes carry. It's the female mosquito that requires human blood to reproduce and has the capability of injecting her saliva into human skin. Depending on where you're located when bitten, her saliva can harbor a virus such as Zika, dengue or chikungunya, not to mention St. Louis encephalitis, malaria or the West Nile virus. Since no vaccine is available for these illnesses, it's important to be aware of measures that can actually prevent mosquito bites. Be prepared and pay attention to alerts about the illnesses that are going around in the places you plan to visit this summer.
https://health.usnews.com/health-care/for-better/articles/2018-06-20/how-to-fend-off-mosquitoes-this-summer
