Every Day Is Special: August 20 - World Mosquito Day

August 20 - World Mosquito Day

Posted on August 20, 2020

World Mosquito Day?

I know we are supposed to honor all living things, because they are part of so many food chains (honestly, food webs!), and they all have a role in the circle of life.

So even ugly critters like hagfish get their special day...

And scavengers (creatures that eat dead creatures) like buzzards get their special day.

Even decomposers (organisms that break down dead organisms and waste products - yeah, we're talking about poop!) like mushrooms and bacteria are usually honored as very important parts of an ecosystem. If there were no such thing as decomposers, there would be no circle of life.

But mosquitos! Yitch! They are so pesky, so bothersome, and many times so deadly. Mosquitos kill more 13 times more people every year than snakes, crocodiles, scorpions, and hippopotamuses combined!

That's because, at least in some tropical locales, mosquitos can carry diseases like malaria. And that is actually why we have a World Mosquito Day: today is the anniversary of the discovery in 1897 that female mosquitos often transmit malaria from person to person. That discovery, made by doctor and polymath Sir Ronald Ross, allowed us to figure out effective ways to combat the disease!

For example, since 2000, almost 7 million lives have been saved by simply using mosquito netting around beds! An estimated BILLION cases of malaria were prevented by those same nets.