The tiger mosquito is present on at least three quarters of the French metropolitan territory, and has colonized more than 40% of the municipalities around the Mediterranean.
To fight against its proliferation, there is only one solution: that everyone adopt the right actions, by removing stagnant water from gardens and terraces.
Because the fight against this species is "a collective challenge": in a neighborhood, if some do not play along, it risks causing nuisance throughout the neighborhood.
Each year, on the arrival of fine weather, EID Méditerranée, the organization responsible for mosquito control on the Mediterranean coast, unveils its campaign to fight against the proliferation of the tiger mosquito. Because if the spreading of larvicide makes life difficult for traditional mosquitoes, which delight in the edges of ponds, fighting this species, Aedes albopictus, is a real “collective challenge”.
The tiger mosquito appeared around the Mediterranean around fifteen years ago.
It first colonized Nice and Menton (Alpes-Maritimes), before expanding to the Languedoc coasts, including Montpellier (Hérault), where the Mediterranean EID is located.
“It first arrived in Italy in the 1990s, with the used tire business,” says Charles Jeannin, medical entomologist within this organization.
It is the man who moved it, via cars, trucks, trains… ”
Particularly present on the rim of the Mediterranean
In France, the tiger mosquito is gradually gaining ground. On January 1, the Ministry of Health had detected it on three quarters of the metropolitan territory, mainly in the south and the center of France, and in the Paris region. But it is on the Mediterranean rim that he takes it easy: in the Alpes-Maritimes, Var, Bouches-du-Rhône, Vaucluse, Gard, Hérault, Pyrénées-Orientales, more than 40 % of municipalities are colonized by the tiger mosquito. Whose fault is it ? To the man.
Because this species grows in cities, as close as possible to the inhabitants.
"The spreading of larvicide would serve absolutely nothing," resumes Charles Jeannin.
Already, it should be practiced above cities.
Impossible, and useless.
Because the mosquito-tiger loves, on terraces, balconies and in gardens, cups filled with stagnant water under flower pots, uncovered water tanks or wet tarpaulins.
"We must repeat the messages"
The only way to fight this species, whose bite causes unpleasant itching and can carry disease, is for everyone to adopt the right actions by removing or covering all the stagnant water, where they lay their eggs.
"It's a community struggle," resumes the medical entomologist.
You have to repeat the messages.
If, in a neighborhood, some do not play the game, it risks causing nuisance throughout the neighborhood.
"If everyone got down to it, the tiger mosquito" would lose ground, "resumes Charles Jeannin.
It is the man who maintains it.
Communities are also targeted by these messages: certain stagnant waters, where females lay between 500 and 900 eggs in its lifetime, are their responsibility.
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Languedoc-Roussillon
Mosquito
Tiger mosquito
Nice
Marseilles
Montpellier
Planet