In recent years a whole host of mosquito repellent products have hit the market, each claiming to keep the user completely safe from the biting menace. One of the most interesting of these products, a natural mosquito deterrent, is a device to be worn on the wrist.
The mosquito deterrent wristband is essentially a piece of material soaked in citronella, the active ingredient of many natural mosquito repellents. The idea of the wrist band is that mosquitoes will avoid biting the wearer because the wristband will surround the wearer with an ‘aura’ of citronella.
The idea is all well and good, but does it work?
Well, sort of. In a controlled lab study of the citronella wristband, two volunteers placed their arms into a container of 500 hungry female mosquitoes (only females bite humans). On the right arm the volunteers wore a citronella wrist band, while the left arm was entirely untreated. Each volunteer held their arms in the mosquito tank for 45 seconds.
The results? Well, the first volunteer took 14 bites on her untreated arm, and just three on the arm with the wristband. The second volunteer took 19 bites on the untreated arm and just one on the arm wearing the wristband.
Pretty impressive results, yeah? Well, maybe, but all this test really proved is that natural mosquito repellent containing citronella can deter mosquitoes. What it didn’t answer was how effective the wristband was out in the real world. After all, when you use a mosquito repellent spray you wouldn’t usually just treat your wrist. The question is this: how far from the wrist does the protection spread?
I decided to test this on a pleasant evening last month. I live in Chiang Mai, a city in the north of Thailand, and in the centre of the old town is an arcade of tourist bars crowded around a small courtyard. It rains most days here so the courtyard is always covered in puddles, and if there’s one thing a mosquito loves it’s standing water.
My girlfriend refused to be my control subject for the experiment, and she drenched herself in citronella natural mosquito repellent. I wore the wristband on my left arm, but nothing else, and we stayed out in the courtyard for about three hours before the heat of the evening forced us home to the air con.
First, my girlfriend: she got two bites on her legs and one on the arm. This is about what you can expect over three hours in mosquito central while using natural mosquito repellent. I, on the other hand, got five bites on my legs, two on my right arm and a couple around my right armpit where one sneaky bugger crawled under my t-shirt. My left arm took just one bite.
So, do wristband mosquito repellents work? Yes they do, but their range is very limited. If you insists on using a wristband to repel mosquitoes you should wear one on each limb. Maybe one around the neck and a big one around the waist, just to be safe.
Or, and I know this is a little unorthodox, you could just spray yourself all over with the exact same mosquito repellent with which they infuse the wristband. It’s not rocket science.