{"id":239840,"date":"2026-06-27T23:29:29","date_gmt":"2026-06-28T04:29:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/06\/scratching-that-bug-bite-might-feel-good-at-first-but-science-explains-why-its-a-bad-idea"},"modified":"2026-06-27T23:29:29","modified_gmt":"2026-06-28T04:29:29","slug":"scratching-that-bug-bite-might-feel-good-at-first-but-science-explains-why-its-a-bad-idea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/06\/scratching-that-bug-bite-might-feel-good-at-first-but-science-explains-why-its-a-bad-idea","title":{"rendered":"Scratching that bug bite might feel good at first but science explains why it\u2019s a bad idea"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/scratching-that-bug-bite-might-feel-good-at-first-but-science-explains-why-its-a-bad-idea2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>You\u2019ve likely heard it since childhood: Don\u2019t scratch that bug bite or rash, you\u2019ll make it worse. But why would something that feels so good be bad?<\/p>\n<p>A lot of things can cause itchiness, sometimes serious diseases. Whatever the cause, doctors have long warned that scratching too much can damage the skin. Now researchers better understand why even a mildly annoying itch could put you on an itch-and-scratch cycle if you give in.<\/p>\n<p>How did they find out? In part by putting tiny \u201ccones of shame\u201d onto mice to uncover what happens on a cellular level when an itch gets scratched\u2014or left alone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You\u2019ve likely heard it since childhood: Don\u2019t scratch that bug bite or rash, you\u2019ll make it worse. But why would something that feels so good be bad? A lot of things can cause itchiness, sometimes serious diseases. Whatever the cause, doctors have long warned that scratching too much can damage the skin. Now researchers better [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,224],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-239840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239840\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}