DEET based insecticide are fine and good, but they only postpone the problem, or transfer the attention of the biting insect to another area of the body or a nearby loved one wearing no repellant. What is needed is a chemical which induces insects to land, walk around, and start to feed. But before the process can be completed, poison soaks into the little bloodsucker and it falls off, dying.
This uses the attraction of bugs to people to decrease the overall population of biting bugs, which must learn to avoid people or die. I envision this product to be a pyrethrin or similar plant product. Conceivably the pyrethrin products marketed for lice treatment could be used for this - more liley the formulation would need to be changed.-- bungston, Sep 12 2003 No mosquito allergy treatment http://www.aaaai.or..._allergy_stings.stm [kbecker, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004] How does DEET work? http://www.torontoh...ials/deet/deet.htmlSome studies found that DEET works only on contact because so little evaporates. Otherwise it wouldn't last so long. [kbecker, Oct 04 2004, last modified Oct 06 2004] and...-- po, Sep 12 2003 I don't mind donating a little blood to a bug that in turn will later feed a little bird. Its just the itch that I hate. I would like to see an allergy treatment for humans that prevents the itch, but my doc says that many have tried and nobody succeeded.
You still get a cookie for the idea of solving this with an evolutionary process instead of killing everything.-- kbecker, Sep 12 2003 How is this less killing than DEET?-- bristolz, Sep 12 2003 DEET doesn't kill at all. It only repels. I have sprayed many a mosquito with Off! and can testify to its lack of knockdown. Unless some flame is added.-- bungston, Sep 12 2003 My point, exactly.-- bristolz, Sep 12 2003 Granted: it is more killing than DEET. But it is not insecticide fog. It kills only the hungry.-- bungston, Sep 12 2003 I can’t think of a way to safely apply this to skin.-- Shz, Sep 12 2003 Oral intake and then secretion through the sweat glands. Five garlic cloves a day. This works so well it even repels other bipeds.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Sep 12 2003 Just use bread to wipe your sweaty forehead and pop it in the toaster. Instant garlic bread.-- DeathNinja, Sep 12 2003 killing is an evolutionary process-- hawg, Sep 12 2003 ok how about this maybe: have some kind of lotion where the mosquito can still bite you but the lotion infects him with some kind germ or nano-robot that will render him/her sterile or impotent...-- hawg, Sep 12 2003 [hawg] You mean like edible Bacillus Thuringiensis? May take some more genetic engineering. In Florida I lived in an apartment complex that had a pond. They treated it with BT twice a year. It killed the mosquitoes, but all the birds got diarrhea. I personally rather have an itch than spending my weekend squatting in the woods.-- kbecker, Sep 12 2003 i'm leaning more toward the idea of a little nano-robot attaching itself to the genetalia of the hapless mosquito and rendering the little organ useless, maybe by performing a bit of sophisticated "micro-surgery"...-- hawg, Sep 15 2003 Nothing to stop you from spraying yourself with one of the flea sprays they sell for cats and dogs. Should have the desired effect, especially if you can secure one of the ones that still contains DDT.-- DrCurry, Sep 15 2003 You can still buy DDT believe it or not, but you can’t put it on your skin. A friend uses it to kill deer ticks (since every member of his family has had lime disease). You can apply it to clothing and it works, but the stuff is so lethal that nobody wants it anywhere near them. So he applies it to cotton swabs in the yard. The white footed mice use them to build nests (um, at his place the tick contracts the disease from the mouse). Clever interception, but I’ll bet it kills all the mice too.-- Shz, Sep 15 2003 [hawg] Fortunately, for Nature's sake, the little vampires that latch onto us with offending regularity are all female. Something to do with feeing their vile offspring. No 'little organ' to do away with. Average, everyday germs would just be spread to other humans it fed upon. A mosquito-based flesh-eating bacteria might be useful...
Or just infuse yourself with Nitroglycerin and hold a candle up. Should suffice for nice a little fireworks show.
Oh, and yes, I'm new. Hoorah.-- Utah, Sep 15 2003 DDT would be fine for the mice. Folks used to douse themselves with it is the 50s without ill effects, and it is still widely used in the third world to treat walls inside houses. Your friend is very wily. But I wonder how he knows if his method works? It seems like this would be hard to evaluate.
I am very surprised to hear you can buy DDT in the USA.-- bungston, Sep 16 2003 It’s an uncontrolled environment. The only observation he can make by doing this is that new cases of lime disease subside.
//I am very surprised to hear you can buy DDT in the USA//
It’s illegal, but with exceptions I guess.-- Shz, Sep 16 2003 So, you're changin the skin or just covering the skin? Does this have anything to do with genetic engineering? If so, please genetically engineer mosquitos that will only attack other mosquitos.-- k_sra, Sep 16 2003 We should all just get genetically engineered so that our sweat glands produce insecticides". They have done this with corn, why not with people? Or better yet we could be genetically engineered to cause male insects to become sterile when they bite us and thus accelerate the demize of human biting insects. This has already been done by the way with the screw worm fly. There was a multiyear project that irradiated male screw worms that were systematically relesed when an outbreak occured. Screw worms are no history in N. America.-- bronco, Sep 16 2003 random, halfbakery