The dictionary states the definition as âin a literal way or senseâ but adds that, informally, it can be âused for emphasis rather than being actually trueâ such as âwe were literally killing ourselves laughingâ. The definition was added in the September 2011 edition, but went unnoticed until this week.
Strictly speaking, it is not AIDS but HIV that spreads through blood, semen and from a mother to child. Mosquitoes cannot transmit HIV for two reasons. Firstly, when the mosquito bites with its probosis, it draws blood and injects saliva, which contains antiviral factors and immunoglobulins and hence cannot transmit HIV. The blood from one person is not injected into the mosquito's next victim.
The mosquito. The Aedes aegypti mosquito is the main vector that transmits the viruses that cause dengue. The viruses are passed on to humans through the bites of an infective female Aedes mosquito, which mainly acquires the virus while feeding on the blood of an infected person. Within the mosquito, the virus infects the mosquito mid-gut and subsequently spreads to the salivary glands over a period of 8-12 days.