Absolutely feel like I got Lyme & Bart from sand fleas in Florida in 2019. Walked the beach/sand dunes for weeks. Vomiting / diarrhea that week, I figured it was food poisoning. Health didn’t crash until moved into Moldy condo 8 months later. BRUTAL!
Garzie said...
running wild said...
It makes sense. As a kid, we had more chiggers here than mosquitoes, but that has changed. And we know mosquitoes can transmit Lyme.
we know bart and probably babesia could most likely be transmitted by mosquitos
because some species of bart are transmitted mainly by sand flies - which are v like mosquitos and feed in the same way
Babesia is definitely mainly transmitted by ticks - its incidence tracks tick populations pretty well - but since it lives within red blood cells and mosquitos( i think inject some of their last meal before drawing blood) in theory they could transmit Babesia inside red blood cells from their last meal - how often this actually happens is not known - but most likely a v rare event
there are a small number of documented cases of lyme being transmitted by horse flies - which feed differently to mosquitos and very differently to ticks - sawing a relatively large hole in the skin, but only being attached for seconds - and transmission this way seems to be only a rare event - perhaps only if they have just bitten something else that was heavily infected.
i have not seen any studies or case reports of lyme itself being transmitted by mosquitos - be interested if there are any.
in the absence of any such documented cases - while it might be theoretically possible- eg again inside infected red blood cells - lyme is not in the blood much - and infection dynamics are reliant to a fair extent on chemicals produced by the tick at the bite site to modify the immune system - so i would guess that infections via thsi route is another v rare event
chiggers:
i think are demonstrated to transmit rickettsia in scientific papers -- like typhus group rickettsias in Asia
bartonella is demonstrated also i think - is is transmitted by a v wide range of vectors - including spiders
a virus - i would give a high chance also - as its tiny and doesn't need a wake up time - like lyme in ticks
all of these tings will be on a sliding scale though - its will not be the case that everyone bitten by an infected vector will become infected
many factors will be involved in the chance of an actual infection in any given exposure
-what % of the vector population are infected
-attachment time
-the "dose" of infectious organism in the bite - vs the minimum infective dose for humans
-the presence or absence of co-factors that support infection - eg tick saliva
-the virulence of the strain of infectious agent involved - not all strains of bart or lyme are as infectious to humans as other
-the condition of the hosts immune system