Dengue fever outbreak leads to shortage of mosquito repellent
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Shelves have gone empty, as residents hunt in vain and resort to DIY alternatives. And surging resale prices are shocking even to Argentines accustomed to triple-digit inflation. The country’s latest crisis: There isn’t enough mosquito repellent.
As the South American country contends with its worst outbreak of dengue fever in recent memory, bug spray has become this season’s hot-ticket item. So hot that it’s sold out in virtually all Buenos Aires stores and going for exorbitant prices online, in some cases as much as 10 times the retail value.
“We’ve been to at least 30 pharmacies all over the city and there is nothing left,” Ana Infante said as she swatted mosquitoes away from her two small daughters, their arms visibly pocked with red bumps. Infante, 42, joined the frenzied race for repellent when her coworker at an empanada shop fell seriously ill with dengue last week.
“All we have is this,” she said, raising her swatting hand.
Rampant hoarding and surging prices have stoked desperation. In one widely shared video from a market in the town of El Talar outside the capital Thursday, shoppers are seen descending on an employee opening new boxes of bug spray, snatching up stock before he could place a single bottle on a shelf.
As public outrage mounted and the repellent shortage evolved from nuisance to national news, the government — busy battling sky-high inflation and near-daily protests — was forced to intervene. On Thursday, authorities lifted import restrictions on foreign-made mosquito repellents to boost supply and announced they would ramp up production at local labs.
“We spoke with producers who told us that they have changed their capacity to produce, they are doing it at their maximum capacity,” Health Minister Mario Russo told the local Telefé channel Thursday in his first TV appearance since the dengue outbreak. When asked how Argentines should protect themselves in the meantime, he offered a warning that was instantly mocked on social media:
“Be careful with shorts,” he said.
The dengue virus has exploded across Latin America over the past muggy weeks of summer in the Southern Hemisphere.
The mosquito-borne illness has long been endemic in countries like Brazil and Colombia, but experts warn the worsening outbreak in Argentina means the Aedes aegypti mosquito has widened its range. Dengue infections in Argentina have soared to over 180,500 this season, according to health authorities, including 129 deaths. That’s six times higher than last season’s count, which was already the worst on record.
Health experts attribute the dengue surge to multiple factors, including the El Niño ocean warming effect and climate change. Recent drenching rains that flooded Buenos Aires have created ideal breeding conditions for mosquitoes.
The dengue problem has been exacerbated by the nationwide run on repellant. Political opponents of Libertarian President Javier Milei’s have used the repellent crisis to criticize the government’s push to deregulate the economy and scrap price controls.
Pharmacists across Buenos Aires — fed up with fielding calls about repellent supply — have put signs on their doors telling customers not to bother.
Since February, wholesalers have hiked prices and some Argentines have stockpiled repellent to resell when stories run out. Now most lotions and sprays online fetch between $20 and $40 — five or 10 times the original market price.
“It’s just outrageous,” said 53-year-old Adrián Contrares, a seller of Gaucho-themed knickknacks at his neighborhood park in northern Buenos Aires. “That’s a day’s wage. Who can afford that? Who would spend that?”