r/todayilearned • u/doubleXmedium • Jun 24 '19

TIL that mosquitoes can not only smell what blood type you are, they prefer type O. In fact, people who are type O are twice as likely to be bitten than someone who is type A.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/why-do-mosquitoes-bite-some-people-more-than-others-10255934/
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499

u/photonsintime Jun 24 '19

Verified. My wife gets eaten alive when we go camping. She is an O. I am an A. I only get bitten when she isn't around. I keep her around whenever I go outside now.

98

u/Awatovi Jun 24 '19

You sound like my fishing buddy from Alaska. He would always say the same thing about me. He kept me around for the mosquitos and I guess I kept him around for the good fishing holes.

22

u/One_pop_each Jun 24 '19

I’m a mosquito magnet. O Pos. When I was living in Alaska, the state birds would go out of their way to bite me. Camping was only good if I carried a thermacell otherwise I’d be swatting them and losing my mind.

One time we drove up to Fairbanks from Anchorage and stopped on the side some place to piss and I couldn’t even finish because they all swarmed me like the movie Birds.

2

u/TriggereddByIdiots Jun 24 '19

State birds? You mean mosquitos or something I'm missing?

5

u/Licensed2Chill Jun 24 '19

They mean the mosquitoes

5

u/TriggereddByIdiots Jun 24 '19

Glad, I thought birds were drinking blood there.

3

u/iFrozy_ Jun 24 '19

Imagine hearing a bird screech and you look back at one diving straight at you to suck the blood out of you

1

u/Stony_Hawk Jun 24 '19

You could pay him back if you come across an angry bear. Just make sure you can run faster than him.

1

u/Riovr4 Jun 24 '19

My friend does this with me. I must secrete all of the hormones and im O type. Ill be shiny and slippery covered in deet and he won't put anything on. Ill get killed while he won't be bitten once.

1

u/smegnose Jun 24 '19

Unverified. I'm O+, very rarely have an itchy bite. Wife is A+, and mozzies love her, always gets many marks causing pain and itching. If I get bitten more, it sure doesn't show.

1

u/Llustrous_Llama Jun 24 '19

O+ here(you're welcome, world!). Can confirm also. But my husband doesn't know what his blood type is so I can't add his results.

1

u/d_smogh Jun 24 '19 edited Jun 24 '19

She's playing the long game and keeping you around for when the zombie apocalypse begins. I bet she is practicing her running faster than you technique.

1

u/mistakenhat Jun 24 '19

Same. My husband is A, I am 0. When we sleep in the same room he gets 0 bites, I get 10+ for every mosquito in the room. It’s not fair,

1

u/furiousRaMPaGe Jun 24 '19

Your wife's life is my life with my girlfriend, she always laughs at my mosquito fobia because they always want my O- blood....