Why Did God Make TheSE CRITTERS?

Kay Adkins

What animal do you think is the deadliest animal in the world? 

Lions? Snakes? Sharks?

Nope.

Which animal has about 3500 species, about 40 of which can potentially kill a human?
​
We’ve all seen hundreds of them (more likely, thousands). We’ve all been driven crazy by their high-pitched buzzing. And when we’re attacked, we’ve all slapped ourselves trying to smush them (either fearfully, BEFORE they strike; or angrily, AFTER they’ve skewered our skin.)

(If you thought of the mosquito, you are correct!)

Most of us have asked this question about them: “WHY??? Why did God make them?”

•   Maybe mosquitos, because they are blood suckers, provide iron for the birds and bats that eat them?
•   Maybe mosquitos were Paul’s ‘thorn in the flesh’ to keep him, and us, dependent on God?
•   Maybe the plague of gnats in Exodus 8 was really a plague of mosquitoes.
•   I know this one for sure: Mosquito larvae provide food for tadpoles in my pond!

​Whether they do anything beneficial or not, mosquitos are, overall, a curse, and I’m sure it happened after the fall.

Mosquito Bytes

According to Wikipedia, mosquitoes carry at least 13 different diseases including malaria, West Nile virus, yellow fever, Zika, and six types of encephalitis, among other diseases I’ve never heard of.​

Statista.com reports that mosquitoes are responsible for 750,000 human deaths annually—more than any other animal including humans, snakes, and dogs (snake bites cause about 100,000 human deaths, while sadly, 437,000 human deaths were caused by other humans). 

I am fifty-eight years old, and my mother still reminds me to wear bug spray.  Now I understand why. My chance of getting a mosquito borne illness is greater than my chances of being murdered or snake bit.

In all seriousness, mosquito borne illnesses are dangerous, but they are also highly preventable. Why are there still so many cases?

In the U.S. we fear West Nile, Zika, and Encephalitis the most. Cities everywhere spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to exterminate mosquitoes in neighborhoods.  Between 2015 and 2016, the number of reported cases of mosquito borne diseases in the U.S. almost doubled, from 55,600 in 2015 to 96,000 in 2016.

Compare our 96,000 U.S. 2016 combined total of all mosquito-borne illnesses to 216 million cases of malaria worldwide.  Malaria took the lives of 445,000 people in 2016.  Ninety percent of malaria cases, and 91% of malaria deaths were in Africa.
​
Children under age five, pregnant mothers, HIV/AIDS patients, and others lacking immunity to malaria are the most at-risk.

Bite Back!

With some basic supplies and some basic education, the statistics can be drastically improved. 

• In fact, the World Health Organization has a goal to eradicate Malaria by the year 2030.
• In fact, since 2007, eight countries have received W.H.O. certification for eliminating malaria completely, including US Arab Emirates, Armenia, Sri Lanka, and Paraguay.

It can be done.  Twenty bucks to the Compassion Bites Back program can provide a child with a treated malaria net to sleep under each night, and will help save the life of that child.

Malaria nets distributed to children in one development center reduced the number of malaria cases in children from 28 to zero.  That is how much difference a $20 net can make.
​
Learn more about the Compassion Bites Back program at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7DPA5YsnHQ.