They are already there, and will be closely scrutinized by health authorities this summer: tiger mosquitoes, which caused 65 cases of dengue fever in mainland France last summer when this disease was until then considered tropical and distant .
Of the 65 cases of dengue fever listed in 2022 in France, 35 were in the Alpes-Maritimes: in the municipalities of Saint-Jeannet and Gattières, on the heights of Nice. Among these 35 patients, Thibault was bitten by a tiger mosquito carrying the virus during an evening with friends, he supposes: “I didn’t feel the precise moment. And we don’t really pay attention to it anymore, we are now used to living with mosquitoes in the summer. It’s not pleasant, but we have no choice. “
After that evening, he suffered from dengue fever for ten days: “Fever up to 39, 40, 41 degrees; pain behind my eyes, headaches, very severe fatigue and inability to eat since I couldn’t keep anything down… In seven to ten days, I ‘ve lost seven or eight kilos. It’s not a cakewalk!” Like Thibault, 34 other patients have been identified in the area, luckily no serious cases. Dr. Davy Plichon, a general practitioner in St Jeannet, treated several infected residents, none of whom knew what dengue fever was. And for good reason : “This is the first time we had this type of pathology in the region.”
“If you’re in shorts and a T-shirt in the garden, you’re devoured. You have to get out your tropical mosquito repellent, absolutely!”
A resident of Saint-Jeannetat franceinfo
The epidemiological investigation did not succeed in tracing the origin of this epidemic, but last summer a mosquito certainly bit a person infected with dengue and who had returned from abroad, probably asymptomatic; and mosquitoes then transmitted the virus among the inhabitants. Residents who, since this episode of dengue fever, fear this insect more.
>>> How the tiger mosquito has colonized France over the past ten years
Last summer, to stop contamination, the Regional Health Agency went door to door, asking residents to empty all stagnant water in the gardens so as not to create a bed for mosquito larvae. In the early morning, she even carried out mosquito control operations in the neighborhoods where there were sick people. “People from the ARS came to ask us for permission to spray early in the morning. When we heard about the dengue fever cases, we said to ourselves that we were going to accept the spraying!”says one of the residents, Nathalie.
Preventive measures renewed for this summer
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The mayor of Saint-Jeannet, Julie Charles, explains that she wanted to communicate “to set up prevention, education, and above all to avoid panic. Because we don’t know dengue fever on our territory!” This summer again, prevention against tiger mosquitoes will be required in Saint-Jeannet, to avoid any new arrival of dengue fever, chikungunya or zika. “It is far from being taken lightly.continues Julie Charles.
“We will have to learn to live with it, and to keep or learn the right reflexes to avoid the proliferation of mosquitoes.”
Julie Charles, Mayor of Saint-Jeannetat franceinfo
Saint-Jeannet was famous until then thanks to the shooting of an Alfred Hitchcock film with Grace Kelly (The hand on the collar, in 1954). From now on, it is because of the first epidemic of dengue in metropolitan France. “It made an impression last summer. I would have preferred that the town not be in the spotlight for this reason!” But the mayor humorously warns that given global warming, the municipality of Saint-Jeannet should not keep the monopoly of dengue fever in mainland France for long…