# Should I go to the doctors?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-go-to-the-doctors/628483>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [July 17, 2012, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-go-to-the-doctors/628483 "2012-07-17T03:31:58Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![mozchron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@mozchron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mozchron)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2012, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-go-to-the-doctors/628483/41 "2012-07-18T12:35:29Z")

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> [@kayaker](#):
>
> No, I meant the ones feeding on you. No concern for spread of disease?

Uh…, for obvious reasons, you don’t do human feeds with infected mosquitoes, only colony mosquitoes that are known to be pathogen-free\*.

For the most part, mosquitoes don’t emerge from the egg carrying pathogens (this does occur at low frequency with some viruses). To get infected mosquitoes, we feed them on blood spiked with the pathogen through a membrane feeder. This is done under biosafety containment conditions.

\*Except under very rare specialized circumstances, like when you feed Plasmodium-infected mosquitoes on people to give them malaria, to test a drug or vaccine (yes, this is actually done!). However, my lab doesn’t work on these kind of experiments.

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**Author:** ![August\_West](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/august_west/32/18069_2.png) [@August\_West](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/August_West)\
**Post date:** [July 19, 2012, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-i-go-to-the-doctors/628483/42 "2012-07-19T23:32:14Z")

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Suddenly, I want to be a mosquito researcher.

I have a BS in Biology and am pretty damned immune to mosquito bites. Am I in?

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