Mosquito control consortium denies that mosquito control is harmful to the fetus

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In their statement, they recalled that on Thursday, citing a statement by virologist Gábor Kemenesi, “unfounded information” appeared in several press products that deltamethrin, the agent used in chemical mosquito control, can cause developmental disorders. According to them, Kemenesi is basing all of this on a statement by the Pesticide Action Network, “an avowedly anti-pesticide” civil organization, and not on actual test data. On the contrary, the truth is that the active ingredient deltamethrin can be used as both a pesticide and a mosquito control throughout the EU, based on many years of toxicological and environmental studies, they stated. Moreover, they continued, only 1 gram/hectare of deltamethrin is used in mosquito control a few times a year in an area, which is one-tenth of the agricultural application. And there is no health data for this dose and exposure that would support the developmental abnormalities mentioned in the article to any small extent.

The statement also addresses the issue of resistance

According to the consortium, contrary to what has been published, phenotypic – i.e. confirmed by biological tests on treated mosquitoes – deltamethrin resistance has not been demonstrated in Hungary so far in biting mosquitoes that play a role in human harm. Out of the 50 domestic species, the presence of the resistance gene has been confirmed in only one species, but it has not been shown that these insects are actually resistant because of this. They emphasized that all mosquito control ordered by the disaster management is carried out in compliance with the laws and regulations of public health authorities. In the past two years, public health authorities have been closely monitoring the implementation of mosquito control measures, and no proceedings have been initiated following the work coordinated by the disaster management. “We find it regrettable that a virologist researcher made a panic-inducing statement on the topic of human toxicology, causing unjustified fear among the population!” they said in their statement, which was signed by Gábor Fekete, CEO of Corax-Bioner Zrt., head of the consortium, and Mátyás Reisinger, president of the Hungarian Association of Health Gas Masters.

MTI