Hunting the Most Dangerous Animal in the World

I know that the many of the people that read these blogs and keep up with All Things New have been affected in some way by Hurricane Irma.  Please know that we are still praying for you and we hope that life gets back to normal soon!

I am not a hunter.  In fact, even though I am from LaGrange, GA and my Dad is from Thomaston, GA (both cities in south GA with a high percentage of hunters) I have never been hunting in my entire life and I have only been fishing 4 or 5 times.  With that said, the following statement is (at least somewhat) true:

I hunt the most dangerous animal in the world on a nightly basis.

Before you scroll down and read the list, see if you can guess the 6 most dangerous animals in the world…

Ok, the following list is a hybrid list from different searches I did on Google, but the list is probably pretty accurate in terms of the 6 most dangerous animals in the world to humans:

1. Mosquitos – averaging somewhere between 600,000 and 1,000,000 deaths per year (mostly malaria related).
2. Snakes – averaging 40,000 to 60,000 deaths per year.
3. Dogs – averaging about 25,000 deaths per year (mostly from rabies).
4. Tsetse fly – averaging about 20,000 to 30,000 deaths per year.
5. Crocodiles – about 1,000 deaths per year.
6. Hippopotamus – about 500 deaths per year.

Now that you see what is, by far, the most dangerous animal in the world, you also probably understand the title of this blog.  Back in the 1950s, many developed countries all but eradicated disease-carrying mosquitos through what is known as a DDT (a synthetic pesticide) program.  However, due to lack of funding, climate, lack of participation, resistance to pesticides, etc. many countries in the world still struggle with diseases carried by mosquitos, the most deadly of which is malaria.  Haiti is one of those countries that has not eradicated disease-carrying mosquitos and because of that, each night, I go mosquito hunting in all 3 of our bedrooms.  Basically what that consists of is me (and now Sophie joins me almost every night) walking around the room with a fly-swatter making sure there are no mosquitos in our bedrooms waiting for an evening feast.  Sophie and Elijah have the extra protection of a mosquito net over their cribs as well.  Another night, I will tell you about our bed time routine, but aside from family, air conditioning, hot water, and better food, an easier bed time routine void of mosquito hunting is one of the things we most look forward to when we return to America.  (If I am being honest, prior to proof-reading this blog, “family” did not make the initial list of things we look forward to…sorry guys!)

It is kind of funny to write about, but mosquitos are one of our biggest fears here for our children and they are just one more thing to worry about on a daily basis.  We are blessed to know that if anything happened to any of our family that we could walk over the Haiti Health Ministries (an incredible ministry down here) and if it were serious we could get to America very quickly.  This, however, is a blessing that many people around the world and especially in developing countries do not have.  We cannot even begin to comprehend the idea that mosquitos cause over 600,000 deaths per year (the majority of them in Africa), and many of them are preventable with something as simple as a mosquito net over the bed.  So this blog is to tell you about something that I do each night that seems kind of like a silly task, but it is really important for us and for our family.  While I might not be hunting big game or even the deadliest animal in America (which happens to be the deer as it is responsible for over 150 driving deaths in America per year followed by dogs and cows) I am hunting by far the most dangerous animal in the world every single night we are in Haiti.