In 1987 Rip Ballou taped an ice-cream carton to his arm. The young US Army doctor was doing his bit for science; inside the carton five hungry mosquitoes set about doing theirs. It's an uncomfortable situation, Ballou remembers with a grimace, to have a bunch of the insects "just whaling away on your arm"; all the more so when you know that they have been carefully infected with malaria parasites, and soon you will be too.
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