What happens when a fly lands on your food?

Waiter, what is this fly doing in my soup? ?Sir, it's passing germs. ?

That disgusting response above isn’t the punchline to a good joke, nor is it going to get someone a huge tip, but it’s true. Why do flies sit or swim in the soup that people drink? Can people still drink this bowl of soup that has been eaten by flies? If you want to know the answer, read on.

Generally, house flies (house flies) do not have venom, stings and fangs. It searches for food in a peaceful way, wallowing in the excrement and garbage of other animals. Flies have no teeth, so they eat liquid food. That's the problem, because many foods are solid. The fly came up with a disgusting solution: it spit on its food. Compounds in its saliva and bile break down food and make it as smooth as soup.

Flies often poop while eating. If a female fly eats, she may lay eggs along with her poop. Flies are truly disgusting creatures.

The process is disgusting, but the end result is harmless, if the flies only eat the soup. But they are opportunists. They eat rotting garbage, and they also eat animal feces, which in turn ingests many pathogens.

Cornell University entomologist Jeff Scott says: House flies are carriers of every unpleasant pathogen you can imagine. Anything that comes out of an animal, like bacteria and viruses, house flies can pick up in animal feces and put it in your sandwich. ?

Experts estimate that adult house flies can transmit more than 100 diseases and parasites, including salmonella, tuberculosis and tapeworms.

Does this mean we should immediately throw away any food that has been touched by flies?

No.

Cameron Webb, a medical entomologist at the University of Sydney, said a mere touch from the pest would be fine.

In most cases, seeing a fly touching your food does not mean you need to throw it away. No healthy person will become sick from such contact with a fly.

Similarly, you should probably interfere with the fly lady before she touches your burger.

The longer the flies stay, the greater the chance that the pathogens they leave behind can grow and multiply on the food, at which point the health risk increases.