The sale of mosquito coils have excalated sharply in recent years in Sri Lanka. We have observed that
the companies that market mosquito coils spend lavishly to stop researches regarding the side effects of the mosquito repellents. On the other hand, the media is also highly dependent on the advertisement income of these companies and the voice against the mosquito coils is internally suppressed.
Doctors do not recommend any mosquito repellent but the mosquito net, but the low income groups have no other option to use coil in slums and refugee camps etc., there are no proper sleeping places to use a mosquito net.
The scientists – Bob Krieger, Travis Dinoff and Xiaofei Zhang of the department of entomology – sampled coils from Indonesia and Asian markets in Southern California and found that the contained "S-2" or octachlorodipropyl ether, banned for sale in the United States, reported the journal Environmental Health Perspectives in 2003.
"It is very possible that the coils are exposing users to bischloromethyl ether, also called BCME, a potent lung carcinogen," said Krieger. "High exposure can occur if the coils are used overnight, as they often are."
