Permethrin on clothes?

[davidmorr]

I'm off to South America shortly where they have even more mosquitos than here, and they carry nasty diseases. I've got the malaria pills and insect repellent for my skin.

However, most mosquitos I have come across seem able to bite through fabric, such as shirts. I've come across equip Debugger Pack which is a permethrin wash for fabric like mosquito nets and clothing. Once the clothes have been rinsed in this, they will kill mosquitoes for up to six months, so the box says.

It seems quite toxic stuff - they provide disposable gloves and warn about inhaling the fumes, or getting it in contact with your skin.

Has anyone used this stuff and did it work?

And also given the warning about not contacting skin, I wonder whether there are likely to be any allergic or other reactions wearing clothes impregnated with it?

[nq111]

I have never used it. Frankly a good DEET product, as nasty as it is, can't be beat when the bitties are thick. I have tried a number of 'nicer' topical repellents and none perform like DEET.

[andrewa]

I've used it on clothes, and it was v successful against NZ sand flies. You can also get clothes impregnated with something from ? Kathmandu.
A

[slparker]

Permethrin is safe to wear, the army use it all the time on deployment to tropical areas. It renders clothes a little stiff and uncomfortable but works well to kill Mozzies before they bite.

[MrWalker]

Permethrin is safe to wear, the army use it all the time on deployment to tropical areas. It renders clothes a little stiff and uncomfortable but works well to kill Mozzies before they bite.

Some people have a reaction to that type of chemical. It can produce a nasty looking rash where you contact the stuff. However, most people are not allergic (test some on yourself before splashing it about) and the rash is reported to be not harmful.

[jacko1956]

I wouldn't recommend sucking spilt tomato sauce off the treated fabric but should be ok to wear especially pants.
DEET is excellent for fly/mosquito protection etc but permethrin is the one you need to help ward off ticks.
Strongly recommend both used regularly.

[andrewa]

Jacko, would you normally suck spilt tomato sauce off clothing?

This is irrelevant to the original poster, but permethrin is apparently deadly to trout.... Relevant to the catch and release ecologically friendly trout fisherman.

I'm not sure about the safety of concentrated DEET - it's neurotoxic. Get it on your lips or tongue, and they go tingly. It melts plastic - eg the backs of Swatch watches, and the batteries fall out. One of our friends put it on her kids legs, and he fell asleep in the back of the car ( not coz of the DEET), and his eg was up against a plastic bag, and all the printing on the bag came off on his leg. It also removed her nail polish, which she wasn't impressed about.

Maybe other uses for DEET - local anaesthetic for fixing wounds, ESP on lips and tongue; removing stuck batteries from swatches; doing decal transfers to skin; removing nail polish. Haven't come across any other uses for permethrin other than killing trout.

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[MrWalker]

This is irrelevant to the original poster, but permethrin is apparently deadly to trout.... Relevant to the catch and release ecologically friendly trout fisherman.

It might not be totally irrelevant. It's deadly to any fish, not just trout, so be really careful where you rinse any clothes that have been soaked in the stuff. Reports of dead fish floating in streams are often found to be due to release of this group of chemicals.
According to Wikipedia it is also highly toxic to cats and they can die if given flea treatments intended for dogs. I had thought it was fairly safe for mammals.

[jacko1956]

When I've been out in the bush for days I would eat a lot of things off of anything...
I have no doubt that like any chemicals common in this world neither of these chemicals are totally "safe" and certainly not totally "green".
The post was about insecticides to use in South America.
If you want to use the most environmentally friendly insecticides against the most human unfriendly insects in the world, be my guest.
I would still recommend to the OP to wear both and be sensible about it.
By the way, the idea that you smother your children with things that are toxic without due caution, or yourself with such gay abandon that it gets on your lips is not one I endorse. I won't even touch the environmentally unfriendly processes involved in the manufacture and use of nail polish.
I suffer badly from tick bites and am going to the USA where ticks carry Lyme disease (presumably that is in South America as well).
Ordinary insecticide/repellant does nothing against ticks. Permethrin does.

[andrewa]

Jacko, the lip tingling issue happens to us in NZ. We only use DEET on our hands and necks/cheeks. If you inadvertently touch your lip, it goes tingly - it certainly isn't smothering, as our friend did.

I agree that in those climes, it is very important to avoid insect bites. My only real experience with miserable biting insects is with NZ sand flies. They seem to find their way into any opening, and even burrow into socks to bite you. They don't bite through Lycra. We use Lycra wrist gauntlets and socks, which are miles better than netting.

The primary way to avoid insects is to cover up. The secondary prevention is insect repellent. The third prevention against malaria is antimalarials.

BTW, if you ever think you have Lyme disease, get it diagnosed in the US. I recently asked for the test to be done on one of my patients. It took 6 weeks for the results to one back!

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[roysta]

Been in South America the last four years in a row, just take the good old Aerogard Tropical pump.
There isn't anything better, forget this DEET nonsense.
And if you're in serious malaria territory, Malarone is the king of the tablets.
Yes, expensive, but, the best.

[roysta]

BTW, if you ever think you have Lyme disease, get it diagnosed in the US. I recently asked for the test to be done on one of my patients. It took 6 weeks for the results to one back!

For the record, we have so many doctors in this country running around saying we don't have Lyme here.
Yes we do, and there's plenty of evidence.

[nq111]

Been in South America the last four years in a row, just take the good old Aerogard Tropical pump.
There isn't anything better, forget this DEET nonsense.

The main active ingredient in Aerogard Tropical Strength IS DEET

[nq111]

The primary way to avoid insects is to cover up. The secondary prevention is insect repellent. The third prevention against malaria is antimalarials.

+1. A skin tight lycra type material is a sin against fashion, but neutral to positive for cooling effect and (at the least) significantly slows the bugs biting (doesn't always stop big mosquitoes). Also more comfortable over a long day than layers of sunscreen and repellent IMO.

[deerndingo]

Permethrin clothes treatment works great on clothes. I'm a mossie magnet and when I wear bush clothes treated with it I have no issues with any bugs. It doesn't stop leeches, but most anything else stops before getting to you. Depending on what concentration you are using it lasts about 5 to 6 washes. I used to be Environmental Health in the RAAF and we used to get the guys to rinse their clothes in it all the time. I would not be caught dead without it in a malaria or dengue endemic country. Sorry about teh delayed response but I'm new to here and only just saw your question.

Use it!

[davidmorr]

In the end I did not use it because the instructions were too vague. After warning how toxic it is, it then quotes the strength to use for three cases, a nylon mosquito net, a cotton shirt and something else. And the concentrations varied greatly, e.g., 20ml in 500ml of water for the mosquito net, 10ml in 4 litres for the shirt. Since I wanted to do a nylon shirt, I rang them up. They had no idea. All they could do was refer me to the instructions.