Yeah, it could be as you mention that there's no means to get the mosquitos off of your back. So in that sense there's no partial failure, but rather a full-on loss upon getting spotted.
There's also the fact that I sometimes found it hard to get my character to whisper the answer to Bug S. Atan, which made the time pressure more frustrating since I couldn't flow between Lady Bug and S. Atan as I should have.
This issue was worsened even more by the fact that mosquitos were closing in on me, just as I struggled to get the collision to trigger.
It is a small detail, but it insidiously hurt the experience in such a way that made it difficult to understand.