Lions and tigers and bears, oh my? Mosquitoes are by far the world's deadliest animals

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
5/1/2014 (3 years ago)
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

While fearsome and dramatic, humanity has little to fear from the more ferocious creatures of the animal kingdom. According to a recent study, sharks kill only 10 people annually, 100 people are felled by lions, crocodiles chow down on people about 1,000 times a year - it is the tiny pest mosquito that kills most of humanity for by its dispensation of illness and disease.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - The deadly disease malaria, among the many diseases carried by mosquitoes, kills more than 600,000 people a year. Another 200 million people suffer from it on a daily basis. - far more than unfortunate individuals that are bitten by crocodiles or wolves.

Spread by mosquitoes, malaria occurs in around 100 countries. It kills approximately 725,000 people every year. The disease places an extremely heavy social and economic burden in developing countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

'Prayer and Action' - Help us end one of the most deadly diseases on Earth, Malaria.

It is estimated 207 million people suffered from the disease in 2012 and 90 percent of deaths occurred in Africa; 77 per cent of which were among children who did not live to see their sixth birthday.

Severe malaria can cause lifelong mental disabilities and can result in death. Malaria's economic impact is estimated to cost billions of dollars in lost productivity each year.

There is hope: For the past 12 years new cases of malaria have fallen by 25 percent, and deaths by 42 percent thanks to better diagnosis, pesticides and the use of bed nets.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation aims to eliminate the disease completely. Unfortunately, the malaria parasite has begun to develop resistance to insecticides and drugs currently used, making the fight extra hard.

Bill Gates shared an infographic on his blog to highlight the world's 15 deadliest animals, based on the number of humans who die from coming into contact with them every year.

Mosquito, which is Spanish for "little fly," kills more people than all the other animals listed put together.
 
"Malaria threatens half of the world's population and causes billions of dollars in lost productivity annually," Gates wrote on his blog.

Other mosquito-borne diseases include dengue fever, yellow fever, and encephalitis.

There are more than 2,500 species of mosquitos, found in over 100 countries and every region apart from Antarctica.

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