Bedbug Scare Hits France

France is putting in efforts to calm nationals as it puts up measures to exterminate bedbugs which have overtaken public space, a sore welcome to expected tourists at the 2024 Summer Olympics Games which take place in just over nine months in between 26 July and 11 August 2024.

Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne called a meeting of ministers for Friday October 6, 2023,  to tackle the bedbug crisis. The country’s transport minister, Clement Beaune, met this week with transportation companies to draw up a plan for monitoring and disinfecting — and to try to ease what some have called a national psychosis inflamed by the media.

“There is no resurgence of cases,” Beaune said, telling reporters that 37 cases were reported in the bus and Metro system and a dozen others on trains proved unfounded — as did viral videos on social media of tiny creatures supposedly burrowing in the seat of a fast train.

This is not the first time France like some other world nations has had to battle these bugs. More than one household in 10 in France was infested with bedbugs between 2017 and 2022, according to a report by the National Agency for Health and Food Safety. The agency relied on a poll by Ipsos to query people on a topic that many prefer to avoid discussing because they fear going public with a bedbug problem will stigmatize them.

But silence is a mistake, experts say. No social category is immune to finding bedbugs in their clothing, blankets or mattresses.

“It’s not at all a hygiene problem. The only thing that interests (bedbugs) is your blood,” said Berenger, the entomologist. “Whether you live in a dump or a palace, it’s the same thing to them.”

Business is booming for companies that eradicate the little brown insects, a process that often starts with detection by dogs trained to sniff out the special odor that bedbugs give off. If an infestation is confirmed, technicians move in to zap the area with super hot steam. Heat and cold are enemies of bedbugs. One French government recommendation for victims is to put well-wrapped clothes in the freezer.

Kevin Le Mestre, director of Lutte Antinuisible, said his company is getting “dozens and dozens” of calls. In the past, he said, people often didn’t react, even to bites.

“Now, as soon as they spot a bite, they don’t ask themselves whether it really comes from bedbugs or not. They call us straight away,” said a pest control technician for the company, Lucas Pradalier, as he disinfected a Paris apartment. A sniffer dog detected bedbugs in a baseboard and between floorboards.

The French public began moving into panic mode about a month ago after reports of bedbugs at a Paris movie theater. Videos began popping up on social networks, showing little insects on trains and buses.

Now, both Socialists and centrists of President Emmanuel Macron’s party want to propose bills to fight bedbugs. Far-left lawmaker Mathilde Panot recently brought a vial of bedbugs to the Parliament to chastise the government for, in her view, letting the creatures run rampant.

Bedbugs, an age-old curse on humans, seemingly disappeared with treatment by harsh, now-banned insecticides. They made a reappearance in the 1950s, especially in densely populated cities like New York. And they travel the world thanks to commerce and tourism.

That adds up to a bedbug challenge for the Paris Olympics starting in July.

“All human population movements are profitable for bedbugs because they go with us, to hotels, in transport,” said Berenger.

Beaune, the transport minister, is hopeful that steps can be taken to ease the public’s fear. But, he conceded, “It’s hell, these bedbugs.”