Way more than that if you count diseases from ticks.
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Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
21–30 of 411 posts
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#22This is why Verily's https://debug.com/ project is so interesting. The idea is to create modified mosquitoes that can't bite or breed and release them to "breed" with the general populous thus neutralizing them.
Another way we can control mosquitoes is by making sure the native bird populations are healthy. Where I live tree and bank swallows eat tons and tons of mosquitoes and other bugs every year which helps control the population. I wouldn't recommend releasing these birds elsewhere because they may not have any natural predators but surely where there are tons of mosquitoes there are also predators of mosquitoes as well.
Otherwise this reminds me of well-meaning efforts to control erosion by planting Kudzu or Himalayan Blackberry everywhere. Ultimately they just become an invasive species. And I could also see eradicating mosquitoes as removing a food species for many other animals. This is a really bad idea.
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#23This is a strangely worded title: why not say "mosquitoes" instead of "tiny insects" since that is what is being referred to? Insects as a whole are of crucial planetary importance.
> This is a strangely worded title
clickbait
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know where that was mentioned in the article, so I think we're going off topic, but isn't the use of cures weighed against their efficacy and danger? No one would suggest chemotherapy for a cold. Hydroxycholorquine has proven to be effective against Malaria, which is terrible and can be deadly, but proven ineffective and in fact can make worse COVID, so it's not recommended to be used there. Makes sense to me…
It's been shown to have no benefit when someone is near-dead from COVID. Don't 80% of people on ventilators die anyway? So ventilators have no benefit. From what I have been reading, the drug does have benefit when used as a prophylactic, in combination with zinc. Of course we now have politicized medicine due to the fact Trump is taking it, and whatever Trump does must be de-facto bad. Now we have countries banning…
Given that the entire world is studying these drugs, and many nations have now suspended their research, I don't think you can chalk it up to a single person, unless you're assuming the entire world is defining their own medical and research policies based upon Twitter outrage.
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#25To put this in a perspective, 1 Mosquito 1,000,000 2 Human 475,000 3 Snake 50,000 4 Dog 25,000 5 Tsetse Fly 10,000 6 Assassin Bug 10,000 7 Freshwater Snail 10,000 8 Ascaris Roundworm 2,500 9 Tapeworm 2,000 10 Crocodile 1,000 11 Hippopotamus 500 12 Elephant 100 13 Lion 100 14 Wolf 10 15 Shark 10 https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-animals-that-kill-mo...
I had never heard of Assassin bug but apparently they are all over North America.
https://www.insectidentification.org/insect-description.asp?...
Wonder if those Murder Hornets will make next year's list?
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hydroxychloroquine has always been unsafe. It's just that in some situations, the risk of malaria is more unsafe.
Wrong. Hydroxychloroquine is safer than acetaminophen. Chloroquine has much higher side effects, but they different drugs, in the same family.
"Common side effects may include vomiting, headache, changes in vision, and muscle weakness. Severe side effects may include allergic reactions, vision problems, and heart problems."
Sure, these side effects may be uncommon, but they're a hell of a lot more common than they are if you don't take hydroxychloroquine.
Incidentally, it's an open secret that a lot of the popular NSAIDs wouldn't be OTC if they were discovered today. Specifically because NSAIDs aren't just "safe", over the counter dosages are quite low--low enough that they're ineffective in many cases, which is why the same NSAIDs are prescribed at orders of magnitude higher doses.
There's historical precedent for "safe" drugs being problematic during a pandemic: aspirin poisoning was a significant cause of death during the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic.
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#27Just as a curiosity, humans kill hundreds of trillions of insects annually.
[1] https://www.quora.com/How-many-insects-die-from-people-stepp...
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#28This is a strangely worded title: why not say "mosquitoes" instead of "tiny insects" since that is what is being referred to? Insects as a whole are of crucial planetary importance.
Sorry. When I cut/paste the subtitle of the article on submission, I thought I grabbed the entire subtext. Not sure how that happened, but I've edited the title.
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#29Hydroxychloroquine has been used as a malaria preventative for 60 years. Now it is suddenly unsafe?
Malarone is also a malaria preventative, and I personally had a psychotic break while taking it, it took 8 men to hold me down and strap me a bed for two days until I came to. Seems pretty harmless I guess?
The disturbing thing is compared to some of the alternatives which can stop breathing in some people that is safer.
Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)
#30This is a strangely worded title: why not say "mosquitoes" instead of "tiny insects" since that is what is being referred to? Insects as a whole are of crucial planetary importance.
Agree, the HN header should be updated. No other insects mentioned.
I updated it and apologized for the error.