Bad Breath as Insecticide? Your Bad Breath May Be Able to Kill Bugs We all have experienced the offensive oral odor of others at various points in our lives, but it seems as though scientists have discovered that your bad breath might actually be good for something. It turns out that the breath of mammals may be useful in developing a non-toxic insecticide and/or insect repellant. Many small insects that feed off of plants have developed a defense mechanism that causes them to fall to the ground when they sense the moisture in a mammal's breath. According to a recent article in Current Biology this insect behavior developed in order to survive if a large mammal should eat a plant that small insects are also feeding on. And this does not have to be the breath of a particular mammal either. The scientists conducting the experiments were forced to wear snorkels to avoid paralyzing the insects with their own breaths. This is exciting news, but it may be a little too soon to expect an annoying housefly to die because you breathed on it. Did you know your bad breath is literally toxic? Does this make you want to start using mouth wash?