Villena intensifies campaign against mosquito infestation

Villena City Council has intensified its campaign against the mosquito infestation with the onset of high temperatures, targeting urban areas and rural zones where water accumulates, as explained today by the Councillor for the Environment, Francisco Iniesta.

The rainy season and high temperatures lead to a proliferation of mosquitoes from these weeks onwards and throughout the rest of the summer. To tackle this situation, actions are also being taken in green areas, parks, ditches, and rural zones in infrastructures such as irrigation channels, wells, reservoirs, and pools.

The City Council, through the pest control company Lokímica, conducts year-round work to prevent the proliferation of these and other insects, but in this phase of the campaign, the number of treatments in the main drains of the municipality is increased.

Iniesta commented that in these weeks, the necessary resources are allocated to ensure that mosquito populations remain controlled below the recommended health thresholds. For this purpose, off-road vehicles equipped with long-range spray and mist cannons are used, as well as detection or treatment drones for areas inaccessible by land.

The company carries out larvicidal treatments using biological products that only affect mosquito larvae and not other fauna. Treatments against adult specimens are also conducted in authorized places, using natural pyrethrins to reduce the adult population as quickly as possible.

On the other hand, recent rains have caused water accumulation in private areas, which must also be treated and are the responsibility of the owners. These measures, along with others that can be taken domestically, can help reduce mosquitoes to optimal levels.

Some measures that can be taken domestically include avoiding containers that can accumulate stagnant water; maintaining adequate chlorine levels in pools; protecting wells and cisterns with mosquito nets; monitoring drip irrigation; renewing animal drinking water every 2 or 3 days; pouring water into drains to prevent stagnation; clearing gutters to prevent water from stagnating, and checking tree holes by covering or emptying stagnant water.