This is a mite you don’t want to meet. Unlike dust mites,
which merely live off the crud of your household and may never set foot on your
skin, Sarcoptes scabiei prefers to get
much closer to its food source. It also eats skin, but it doesn’t wait
for you to shed it. Instead, the mites burrow into the outer layer of
epidermis, making tunnels where they can live and lay their eggs. Where they
set up housekeeping, they cause intense itching, and the scratching that ensues
makes wounds that bacteria can thrive inside. We call the itching and lesions
scabies (and related species of mite infesting our furry friends cause mange).
Image: Jens Mattssen, National Veterinary
Institute, Uppsala, Sweden
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