Both sexes feed at night on blood using piercing and cutting mouthparts. Up to a third of a gramme of blood can be consumed per feed. Unfortunately, another way of contracting the disease is through blood transfusion of poorly monitored blood. Eggs are laid in crevices and cracks of walls and rooves, and in the burrows of small mammals. Greyish in colour, they are characteristically dorso-ventrally flattened and both sexes feed on blood through mouthparts designed for piercing and sucking.
Head lice are secondary vectors.
Crushed lice or lice faeces coming into contact with broken skin leads to transmission of both diseases. Eggs are laid singly and glued to the hair. Development to the nymph takes 7-11 days. Different flea species have different specificities for different hosts, including man, mammals and birds. Brownish, apterous and laterally compressed, both males and females feed on blood through mouthparts designed for piercing and sucking.