Only Female Mosquitoes Suck Blood

I’ve always loved the line “If you think you’re too small to make a difference, you haven’t spent a night in bed with a mosquito.” And now a mosquito has proved its mighty power by taking out a news reader live on TV.

The poor Taiwanese television presenter ended up in hospital after the mosquito flew into her mouth, and choked her in the middle of the news.

According to AFP, the mosquito got stuck in Huang Ching’s windpipe, setting off an asthma attack and forcing the live broadcast to cut to a four minute ad break while they scrambled to find someone else to jump in the presenter’s seat.

The senior anchor spent a day in hospital, and told AFP “I never expected a mosquito to have such a great power. It really gave me a bad day.”

While I may not have ended up in hospital after a run in with the little blood suckers, I have endured many an adventure with mosquitoes over the years. If I’m around, other people can spare the trouble of putting on repellant, because they’ll get a free pass as my exposed skin turns into mozzie-palooza.

I remember on a trip through the Three Gorges in China, talking to a lovely local guy who shares my mosquito attracting super powers. As we pondered what it was about our blood that brought the critters swarming towards us, he told me, “You know, it’s only the female mosquitoes that bite.”

I found that fascinating, and always remembered it. I’m embarrassed to admit that it was about six months later, as I was about to tell someone that little bit of trivia over a few drinks that I thought to myself “So what do the male mosquitoes eat then?”

See, I’d always thought mozzies were little vampires that lived on blood. But as probably every primary school kid could tell me, mozzies are usually vegetarians. They live off the sugar in plants.

But the females need blood for protein when they have babies. Without it, they can’t make their mini me mosquitoes. And apparently every time they suck our blood, it gives them enough protein for 250 eggs.

Buddhists look away now, but I have to say that gives me a certain satisfaction when I slap a mosquito on my skin and see my fresh blood smear out, knowing I’ve just taken 251 mosquitoes out of the equation.

Hmmm… maybe that’s why they target me?