Just when you think they have disappeared for the year, back they come. There was a swarm of them in our carpark yesterday and M Aixcentric got bitten on the cheek (the one next to his nose!). Luckily, and this is the reason for this post, Synthol is back in the pharmacies again. 
I reported 15 months ago that it had disappeared from the shelves and none of the pharmacists I spoke to knew when it would be back.
When we first visited the Camargue, and ended up with an impressive array of bites, our local pharmacist said that we should put Synthol on cotton wool and hold it on the bite for a full ten minutes, then use Onctose and ‘voila, fin de probleme!’. She was right. But it turned out that other people had other uses for it, often injecting it for body-building. So I guess it’s been made to a new formula?
Anyway, it’s back and yesterday’s bite is a thing of the past. I hope that’s the end of moustiques for another year….
aixcentric 
Having lived in area infested by tiger mosquitos for the past few years, we’ve found that cinq sur cinq is the best repellant, and treating bites with apple cider vinegar on cotton wool as soon as you’re bitten really helps (stings to start with but the bite only itches a bit for a short while, as opposed to days). I have no science to back this up, but we tried everything out of desperation. For those from the UK savlon and sudocrem seem to help clam the itching too.
That’s really interesting and I will add it to a post In the spring when these wretched things come out again!