After days of rain, Albertans were treated to some sunshine this weekend, but the conditions also meant a familiar buzzing nuisance made an appearance.
While some species of mosquito have the potential to spread certain diseases — including West Nile Virus, numerous varieties of encephalitis and dengue fever — health experts don’t think COVID-19 is transmitted through skeeters.
On the weekend, Alberta’s chief medical officer of health said she had been fielding questions about COVID-19 and mosquitoes.
“To date, there is no information or evidence that suggests COVID-19 is transmitted by mosquitoes,” she wrote in a message on Twitter.
“It’s a respiratory virus spread through droplets in an infected person’s saliva/nasal discharge when they cough, sneeze, or talk.”
The World Health Organization also says mosquitoes cannot transmit COVID-19, according to a handy list of COVID-19 myth busters on the organization’s website.
“Albertans should, however, be thinking, as the summer approaches, of illnesses like West Nile virus,” Hinshaw said.
Dr. Jason Kindrachuk, a researcher of emerging viruses at the University of Manitoba, concurs, telling Global News of all the things we have to worry about, mosquitoes aren’t among them.
“The lucky thing for us is that this virus and this family of viruses is not one that is carried by insects,” he explained. “So the likelihood of transmission is very much minimal.”
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