Mosquitoes' problems

Okay, so we've discussed the mosquitoes appearance and life cycle. Now let's cover what mosquitoes are most famous for, sucking blood. Mosquitoes suck blood from various animals. You see, a mosquito has a long feeder appendage in its mouth. The appendage penetrates an animal's skin, then the mosquito sucks the animal's blood. Interestingly, only females suck blood. The blood they get enables them to reproduce. How so? Proteins in the blood they suck help them produce the eggs they lay. So they don't use the blood as food. For food, both female and male mosquitoes usually eat nectar from plants. Tragically, mosquitoes kill more people than any other creature on earth. Their bites don't kill, though, but the diseases that mosquitoes carry do. Millions of people die every year from malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever and other diseases that mosquitoes carry. When mosquitoes bite people, they transmit whatever diseases they happen to be carrying. Each year, more than 2 million people die from mosquito-carried diseases. That's a big number, huh Unfortunately, controlling mosquitoes is difficult, since they breed and spread rapidly. They lay their eggs in stagnant water, like in swamps. So, draining these areas can control them. Insecticides, you know, insect killers, can also eliminate them. DDT is one such insecticide. It's highly effective, but it's banned in many countries. Some people claim that DDT harms certain animals. Still, in countries that use DDT, there are fewer deaths by diseases transmitted by mosquitoes.