Can mosquitos give you AIDS?!
Question:
Can mosquitos give you AIDS?
Someone asked me that question the other day and I didn't know how to answer because I have no idea if it's true. Can anyone help me with this question?
Answers:
No they cannot. Absolutely not. This is a persistent and common myth about AIDS.
When a mosquito bites someone, it does not inject its own blood or the blood of an animal or person it has bitten into the next person it bites. The mosquito does inject saliva, which acts as a lubricant so that it can feed more effectively. Yellow fever and malaria can be transmitted through the saliva, but HIV does not reproduce in insects, so the virus doesn't survive in the mosquito long enough to be transmitted in the saliva.
Additionally, mosquitoes don't normally travel from one person to another after ingesting blood. The insects need time to digest the blood meal before moving on.