Description
96 percent of mosquito nets tear within a single year of use, with our data quantifying the average net tear happening at 9.2 months. Unfortunately, these tears allow mosquitoes to fly through, rendering the nets ineffective. More importantly, research has shown that community members throw away their torn mosquito net entirely because it is deemed as “untidy”.
This kit is a simple and easy way to fix holes in any mosquito nets. It comes with all of the materials needed to patch any tears in the netting and increases the lifespan of the mosquito net by an estimated two years. The stitching method shown in the included instructions was specially selected through rigorous testing to ensure the optimal combination of effectiveness and ease. After using the kit, the affected area is experimentally over twice as durable, ensuring that the user will not need to re-patch the same area. The kit comes with 1.5 square feet(0.15 m^2) of patching material, allowing the community member to patch over 20 average size holes.
The instructional booklet provided with the kit is picture-based, extremely simple, and can be quickly translated into multiple different languages if required for the end-user. During our first distribution in Uganda, it took children less than 10 minutes to repair their net using our kit. Our packaging is incredibly compact, meaning that shipping is incredibly simple for wherever its final destination will be.
So far 80 percent of people from our first distribution have used our kit, increasing the lifespan of their net by almost a year – and counting!
