Students go to the ACLO sports centre expecting to get their sweat on. But recently, they’ve been losing more bodily fluids than they bargained for: a plague of mosquitoes is out for their blood.
‘A mosquito managed to bite me five times on the same leg, even though I wear long sleeves and long pants’, says student Lucía Espinosa, who works at ACLO as a supervisor. ‘It’s quite bad.’
As temperatures outside are rising, more and more mosquitoes are making their way into the gym. It’s become a common sight to see people stop their workout to chase away a mosquito. ‘People come up to me to ask what is going on. I can only respond that I have no idea either’, says Lucía.
Water
Sports centre director Niels van den Bovenkamp does know what the issue is. ‘The building is old and the ground underneath it is sinking. That movement has caused the pipes to leak and the water attracted the mosquitoes, we believe.’
The leak has been found and the water pool drained, he says. ‘And we are working to tackle the mosquito infestation, but it may take two weeks for that to be completely resolved. This week is already better than last week and we expect there to be fewer mosquitoes again next week.’
‘They have given us a special light device that kills mosquitoes’, says Lucía. One of them is at the front desk and seems to be working, according to an enthusiastic employee: ‘I haven’t seen a mosquito in the last thirty minutes!’
In between scratching, the ACLO employees can laugh about the situation, says Lucía. ‘I came to work one day and I saw my workmate on top of the desk’, she says. ‘I asked: what are you doing? And she said: I can’t stand this anymore! I can’t stand this situation! I am killing the mosquitoes!’