holidays, you might consider taking a live
chicken. Scientists in Ethiopia have shown
that sleeping in a room with a chicken
reduces the likelihood of being bitten by
mosquitoes. For the trial – designed to test
whether chicken odours could help prevent
malaria – the researchers arranged for
volunteers to sleep either with live chickens
in cages hung near their beds, or in normal
conditions. Mosquito traps were placed in
the rooms and, sure enough, the traps in
the poultry-containing rooms yielded many
fewer insects. The scientists believe that
mosquitoes – which are known not to bite
chickens – see the birds as potential
predators and keep away. The researchers
now hope to develop a chicken-based
repellent that humans can’t smell.
