Summer is a wonderful time to be alive — the sun rises early and doesn’t set until long after dinner, school is on holiday and most jobs have looser hours, and everyone is more relaxed and happy than they are during the winter. That is, until the summer scourge strikes — mosquitoes! People have devised some truly crazy ways to keep themselves free of mosquito bites during the dog days of summer, but recent scientific breakthroughs have decisively proven that one of these home remedies is the real deal.
Mosquitoes are heavily attracted to lactic acid, which humans secrete when we sweat. They are also more attracted to people with certain blood types: people with type O are unfortunately providing a lavish feast for mosquitoes, while people with type B and type A trail slightly behind. All of this is important in theory, but in reality, people getting swarmed by these obnoxious bugs only have one thought in their minds: how can I stop these horrible attacks?
People have always had limited defense against mosquitoes, but that has not stopped our ancestors from devising some truly insane tactics. Until recently, the best known deterrent was cloaking yourself in disgusting bug spray, closely followed by wearing ugly netted clothing or attempting to craft mosquito-repellent candles to carry around with you.
However, brand new research has shown that ingestion of vitamin B1 is incredibly effective in dissuading mosquitoes from biting our skin. A man from Shepherd School, a popular YouTube channel that explores outdoors and farm-related life hacks, explained in a recent video that vitamin B1 changes the smell of our sweat at a microscopic level. The change in smell is not strong enough for humans to notice, but it appears to have a major effect on the attraction that mosquitoes have to our sweat. Ingesting certain supplements that contain high doses of B1, along with secondary actors like folic acid and vitamin C, can actually actively repel mosquitoes, even at high noon on a crowded lake.
Scientists are unsure of exactly why B1 is so effective against these winged annoyances, but the results are in and they couldn’t be clearer: taking B1 supplements is the most effective way to protect yourself against mosquito bites during the summer. Make sure to take along enough supplements to the next family barbecue for mom, dad and all of the cousins, and get ready to enjoy your summer fun free from the troublesome buggers of the season.