How To Treat Chigger Bites
- Tuesday, May 26, 2009, 1:02
- Health Care, Skin Problems
- 10,098 views
- 3 comments
Chiggers are tiny microscopic living beings that have a propensity to come into view most often in the southern parts of the US towards late spring, summer, and early fall. They do appear in other parts of the world, around the same time of the year. Biologically Chiggers are larvae of mites known as harvest mites that are closely correlated to ticks. The larvae are mostly found outdoors, particularly in areas that have growth of tall grass or dense shrubbery.
You may find it of interest to learn that it is larvae that bites whereas adult harvest mites feed mainly on plants and are harmless. Another interestingly unusual feature is that they do not survive on human blood but on its skin. The bites, as is usual with any other insect, are very irritating and prickly. Though they do not need human blood for survival, they can transmit diseases.
These are known carriers of scrub typhus that causes skin rashes and fever in parts of Australia and Asia. On the whole their bites cause irritation often followed with swelling in most of the U.S or other parts of the world. But that’s a temporary problem. But that should not prompt you to ignore their bites. The irritation and the accompanying pain as a consequence of their bite would really traumatize anybody, especially toddlers.
Treatment
The treatment of these bites is not difficult to follow. Fortunately, chiggers do not remain stuck to the skin for too long. Obviously the first thing that should come to your mind is to have a thorough bath and scrub your skin to get rid of any chigger that might have remained clung to the skin.
Apart from giving a bath to the affected person there is not much that one can do to treat such bites, except to apply some ointment or cream on the affected part of the skin to reduce irritation and the associated restlessness.
You will be playing it safe by applying calamine lotion, hydrocortisone, or benzyl benzoate that is generally readily available around the house. But, be sure not to apply nail polish in that confused state of mind thinking that the polish would cover the affected part of the skin that may still be having any chigger, and thus suffocate and kill the poor insect.
About the Author
sanjay has written 385 stories on this site.
This is not accurate. Bathing and applying ointment will not kill chiggers. The chiggers themselves lay larvae in the skin and reproduce in cycles. Permethrins must be applied, and applied for several days of more in order to kill reemerging cycles of eggs. I have chiggers right now, it leads to a condition called scabies. Scabies forms when chigger infestations become damaging enough for there to be visible open wounds. Antibiotic ointments are helpful to maintain moisture and prevent infection.
p.s.
I advise against referring to an organism that lays eggs in your skin and can cause large seeping sores as a “poor insect”. A serious chigger infection is much worse than this article states.
Darling, The first comment was spot on. You are so wrong Stacie. chiggers and scabies are two totally different things. chiggers feed on you for a few days and then fall off. they are the junivile form of the mite and do not lay eggs. scabies are a different type of mite all together. they do lay eggs and live on a human during their live cycle. scabies will not go away with out treatment, chiggers will