Text | Slow Hardcore said
Edit | Slow Hardcore said
Counting down 30 years, everyone has their heads "topping" lice.
Older generations probably know best that in the past, lice removal was commonplace.
The family members "picked their heads" at each other, and there was paper underneath to see if there were "black sesame seeds" in the hair slit.
If you pick out the lice and squeeze your finger to listen to it, the picture is really unforgettable.
However, such a thing that can be called a shadow of childhood is difficult to see in the younger generation today.
The lice that once "rampantly" on the head of human beings for thousands of years seem to have disappeared in just 30 years, and the result is man-made or "natural disaster"?
01 The "rampant" of lice in the last century
Before the 21st century, lice were still creatures that multiplied wildly in many people on the mainland.
In the past, when I heard about lice, I would start to let my family pick your scalp against the light.
Fingers opened a little along the cracks in the hair, and from time to time they could pluck out those live lice.
Many even have lice eggs on their heads, which are attached to their hair in white.
In that economically and culturally underdeveloped situation, it is almost common for people to be parasitized by this creature.
In the countryside of the last century, there were many old people and children who had such a habit.
Every day before going to bed, look at each other at the top of each other's heads, and after a careful rout, no lice are found, and then they can sleep peacefully.
And many of the grates left by the older generation at home were also used to remove lice in the past.
Pick at the head with the thin tooth tips of the grate, comb it off the top of the head, and a group of live lice will fall off the hair.
That scene may be extremely shocking to someone who has not seen it.
Most of today's post-00s do not have this kind of personal experience.
But for people before, lice were a common topic.
It does not only grow on people, but also rural domestic animals and poultry.
In fact, most places with hair are prone to lice.
For example, human hair, domestic animal hair layer, etc.
Many people now visit the zoo to see monkeys, and they are also fortunate enough to see them weeding each other's lice.
But lice are not only found in hair and hair.
They are roughly divided into three types, in addition to head lice, there are also body lice and pubic lice.
Head lice, as the name suggests, are the most likely lice to grow in human hair.
Body lice are generally distributed on the body and clothing, and pubic lice grow in private parts and are more disliked.
They are all called lice, but they have now belonged to different species.
Some people may ask, have lice evolved for a long time?
You don't say, it really is.
Now some scientific research shows that it is likely to come out before our ancestors.
Before humans evolved into advanced species, lice have been on Earth for many centuries.
Scientists have confirmed that lice are creatures that even the previous earth dominating species could not do.
Dinosaurs existed during the time they lived.
Since their biological habits were parasitic mammals, most land mammals had lice on them, as dinosaurs were at the time
It is likely that it will also suffer from it.
After surviving for tens of thousands of years, it cannot be easily extinct, and lice have been parasitic in the natural environment until humans appear.
Many people can't imagine that our ancestors have been dealing with these parasites since ancient times.
The grate mentioned above has a history of more than 1700 years on the mainland.
It originated in the Spring and Autumn Period, was invented by a prisoner in the Jin Dynasty, and was also used to remove head lice.
The ancients later made this kind of thing more and more perfect, and finally passed down to this day, that is, the grate that our older generation often uses.
Of course, this method is actually only one of the head lice, purely auxiliary.
Because lice are creatures that are difficult to eradicate once they are parasitic.
They are very capable of reproduction and have a very short lifespan.
It can be said that in a short period of time, it can be quickly replaced, even if a wave is removed, only a few fish that have slipped through the net may be resurrected by them.
Generally speaking, if one person in the family has lice on his body, it is difficult for others to be spared.
In the case of eating and living with this person, the lice eggs can easily stick to other people and eventually be parasitized.
In the era when lice were still "prosperous", many elderly people and children were hard-hit areas, and sometimes it was difficult to completely remove them by various methods.
If there are lice after 70 or 80 who have been parasitic, they may know something like "six six six powder".
In the past, some adults would use this powder to pour on the heads of small children to remove lice.
Wrap it in a towel, rinse it with hot water after a while, or even wash it again with detergent.
The pungent and unpleasant smell can simply float out "ten miles away".
In addition, in addition to "six six six powder", there are also people who use the pesticide "dichlorvos" to wash their hair and remove lice.
This is enough to see how "powerful" the lice are.
Although these drugs are no longer produced because of pesticide pollution problems, and many people have not seen this "strange situation", the shadow of long lice has always remained in the hearts of many people.
As soon as many Chinese people hear lice, they begin to "chill", thinking that this thing cannot be removed and removed, like a "dog skin plaster".
But since the 21st century, lice have appeared less and less in humans.
People did not expect that such a "blood-sucking bully" who had been active for tens of thousands of years could one day be made to nowhere?
In fact, this also talks about the species characteristics of lice and the development and changes of mainland social customs.
02 Why are the lice gone
As mentioned above, lice themselves have a strong reproductive capacity.
Although they have only one and a half months of life in life, they can lay about 400 eggs.
These lice eggs are often called lice and can easily adhere to human skin, hair and clothing.
It only takes a week to change from an egg to a small lice, and the vitality is strong.
For parasitic subjects, even after the method of removing lice, it is easy to regenerate them if there is a small or just a few lice left.
In addition, in the past, the mainland was parasitic with lice and the density of chinese people was very high.
Lice are in large groups, and there is always a lot of interaction between different people, which is easily infected.
In the end, the lice became an inexhaustible "nightmare" for everyone.
But this nightmare is not without weaknesses.
Lice have very simple requirements for their parasitic living environment, and they cannot survive if they are too hot, too cold or too wet.
For example, when the temperature exceeds 50 ° C or below minus 15 ° C, the lice are easily killed.
In this case of high temperature sterilization, lice are even more unlikely to survive.
In addition, their eggs, although they carry their own sticky substances, can help the eggs stick firmly to the hair or clothing.
But vinegar can dissolve this sticky substance and finally let the lice fall off easily.
In the past, many people would use the method of exposing quilts and clothes to the sun to sterilize and remove lice.
It is not difficult to see that if you want to get rid of lice, you must be inseparable from high temperature sterilization, water washing and other conditions.
But in the last century or even earlier, the awareness of hygiene was far less widespread than it is now.
At that time, because of the backward production technology, many people at the bottom did not have the opportunity to have better living conditions.
Not enough to eat and wear is not warm, bathing and cleaning have to lean back, when life is difficult, many people do not bathe for 1 or 2 months is not a rare thing.
But coincidentally, for lice, their favorite living environment is the natural state of human temperature environment.
If someone does not wash their body and hair frequently, it is easy to be parasitic by lice for a long time.
In the past years of scarcity, the human body became a hotbed for lice to grow.
And people's understanding of the biological habits of lice is also a blank, and this creature will have the opportunity to wreak havoc.
However, since the mainland's rapid economic development after the reform and opening up, people's living standards have greatly improved, and these situations have changed.
At the end of the last century, the mainland began to increase the publicity of health knowledge to the public, especially in remote rural areas.
In the 10 years from 1991 to 2000 alone, the mainland's investment in rural health care increased from 30 billion yuan to more than 150 billion yuan.
Many people have been popularized to pay attention to the hygiene of life, clean and clean the common sense of life.
Nowadays, some people have developed the habit of bathing every day, and under such a high-frequency personal hygiene cleaning, the environment suitable for lice to live has gradually disappeared.
Many post-90s and post-00s generations can no longer imagine what a terrible scenario it is to have parasitic lice on the body.
There are fewer and fewer creatures, and that's certainly a good thing for humans.
03 Benefits of lice disappearing
People who have not been infected with lice may not know that in addition to the psychological nausea it can bring, this creature can also have a very bad effect on physical diseases.
The first is the infectious disease aspect.
If lice are parasitic and spread in large numbers in the population, they can easily infect various infectious diseases.
They carry a large number of viruses that enter the human bloodstream through parasitism, causing infection.
And the diseases transmitted by different species of lice are not the same.
Head lice generally transmit relapse fever, an infectious disease, and is the most common mode of transmission of the disease in mainland China.
Winter and spring are the seasons of high incidence of this disease every year.
Body lice, on the other hand, are more diverse.
They carry more viruses that can be transmitted in wartime, such as epidemic macules, lice-borne relapse fever, trench fever, etc., and are a highly contagious disease vector.
In addition to the mass harm, the parasitism of lice is also a very torturous thing for individuals.
After being bitten by a lice and sucking blood, the saliva of the lice will enter the subcutaneous tissue of the human body, which is what causes the parasite to feel itchy and want to scratch with his hands.
But this often makes the wound grow pustules, which is more difficult to grow well, a vicious circle.
Nowadays, many people will no longer be easily parasitic lice, and these diseases have been greatly contained.
However, in fact, in some backward and poor areas, there are still cases of lice parasitizing the human body and spreading diseases.
For example, in India, a country that is less developed abroad, there are still many people in many parts of their country who are plagued by lice.
Among some adolescent groups on the mainland, some people who do not pay much attention to personal hygiene are also prone to breed head lice.
Usually at this time, the doctors in the hospital will advise bitterly: be sure to change clothes and take more baths!
04 Summary
Since ancient times, people have come up with various ways to fight the parasite of lice, but they have not been cured for thousands of years.
As a result, in modern times, they have disappeared from the public eye so easily.
In addition to the progress of science and technology and biological knowledge, there is also an improvement in the degree of human civilization.