An Irish rugby fan has had his accommodation cancelled because of the bedbug epidemic in France, prompting fears of further cancellations as the world cup proceeds to the knock out stages and reports of bed bugs fill French social media.
Speaking to the Irish Independent, Travel Extra editor Eoghan Corry said that the perennial bed bugs story is often overstated by the media. “it will likely have zero impact on Irish rugby fans who famously focus on the event they are attending and the associated revelry. I know rugby fans whose idea of packing for the trip is a toothbrush in their inside jacket packet.”
“Each year, the seasonal increase is bigger than the last one,” according to Jean-Michel Berenger, an entomologist at Marseille’s main hospital and France’s leading expert on les punaises. “”Every late summer we see a big increase in bedbugs because people have been moving about over July and August, and they bring them back in their luggage.”
“It is a good thing in a way because it serves to make people aware of the problem, and the sooner you act against bedbugs the better. But a lot of the problem is being exaggerated.”
Mr Berenger says people are liable to panic about bedbugs because we have lost the collective memory of them.
The problem is exacerbated by a more resistant breed of bedbug. After World War Two, bedbugs were massively reduced in number by the widespread use of DDT, since banned because of their effect on humans. It has led to an increase in reports about bedbugs.
Bed bugs can also live up to a year without food, which could tide some of them over until the Olympics in Paris next year.
