Can HIV/AIDS be transmitted through mosquito bites?
Disease description:
I am 32 years old this year. As mosquito populations increase, many people are getting bitten by insects. Insect bites often cause redness, swelling, and itching; in severe cases, blisters may even develop. I would like to know: Can HIV/AIDS be transmitted through insect bites?
Doctor's answer (1)
Dr. Liu Wan
Stab wounds do not transmit HIV. Currently, the medically accepted routes of HIV transmission are blood-to-blood contact, sexual contact, and mother-to-child transmission. The blood of individuals infected with HIV contains high levels of the virus; however, when a mosquito bites an HIV-positive person, although virus-containing blood may be ingested by the mosquito, HIV cannot survive or replicate within the mosquito and is rapidly destroyed by digestive enzymes in the mosquito’s gut. Moreover, mosquitoes do not inject blood into new hosts during subsequent bites—they inject saliva to prevent clotting, but do not regurgitate blood. Even if minute traces of blood remain on the mosquito’s proboscis, the viral load would be far too low to cause infection. Therefore, HIV cannot be transmitted through mosquito bites.
