The More You Know

Monday, May 16th, 2005 at 5:15 pm

You learn something new every day. Like this interesting fact out of my Introductory Medical Parasitology text:

Many of the 115 species of reduviid (kissing, asssasin or cone nosed bugs) act as vectors of the parasite T. cruzi. The term kissing bug comes from the habit of the vector taking a blood meal from around the mouth or eyes of a host. Feeding may last up to 25 minutes. Epidemiologically important vectors defecate either during or immediately after feeding and the the parasite is expelled in the bug's feces and may be rubbed into mucus membranes or wounds. With these bugs it is better to carefully flick them off and not slap them as with mosquitoes!

I'll be sure to keep that in mind! :-)


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sonja Says:
May 17th, 2005 at 9:11 am

yuck!

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Clauber Says:
June 4th, 2005 at 11:59 pm

Hi! I’m a medical student from Brazil. More exactly Sergipe, a state north of Bahia. I think you already heard about Bahia, so it makes things easier. I could add some interesting things about this bug. Here the common name for it is “Barbeiro”, that means barber. And it’s very common here in Brazil. The kissing bug likes to live in poor house there are made of clay (i don’t know the exact word in English). If you would like to contact me, send me an e-mail. It will be a pleasure to talk to you.

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Carsten Says:
June 5th, 2005 at 6:27 pm

Very interesting, thanks for the additional info. I removed your email address from public display, out of reach of the spam bots. :-)

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