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Mosquito splinters (lemmy.cafe)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Just a random shower thought.

Mosquito's proboscis is sharp enough to penetrate your skin. So when you smack it while it is in the process of drawing your blood, isn't there a chance of its proboscis being forcefully jammed into your skin, leading to some sort of "splinter"? Or does it somehow loses its stiffness the moment it feels the impact?

I've never encountered nor heard of such occurrence in my lifetime of killing those buggers, but wondering if such a thing is even possible. If such could happen, I could only imagine the risk associated with having a piece of foreign organic matter being embed in the body

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[–] jopepa 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

One time I fell into a thorn bush then weeks later after I the bad cut on my hand was healed but it was still itchier than that one spot on a dog’s butt they can’t quite reach. It was driving me nuts, I kept scratching and scratching then out shot a thorn that was almost 2 cms long.

Long gross way to say: Our bodies are really good at homeostasis, it’s why tattoos fade

[–] victorz 0 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Had to look up homeostasis... Seems like a big umbrella term for many different things. 🤷‍♂️ I am none the wiser after 30 seconds of skimming.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Homeostasis is a giant catch-all term for normalizing things in or about the body. In this context, something foreign is introduced to the body (thorn or the tattoo ink) which is affecting the "normal"(equalibrium) state of the body. The body will then do its best to return to this equilibrium, and in these cases, that involves expelling (thorn) or slowly removing (dye) the objects from the body.

I'm going off of memory, but homeostasis also covers our body temperature and chemicals. It's why medical personnel can take blood and learn about issues; there is an expected range for everything to be in. Homeostasis is just that over-all term for "things should be this way". There are dozens of equalizing processes under the term "homeostasis".

[–] victorz 1 points 10 months ago

Very interesting. Thank you for going into more detail for me! :-)

[–] jopepa 0 points 10 months ago

To put it another way, the mosquito beak won’t stay in your skin for long. A 2 cm thorn that got much deeper and healed over still got pushed out.