As millions prepare to attend the 2024 Olympics in Paris, some are concerned about unwanted spectators: bedbugs.
Just nine months ago, in October 2023, a bedbug crisis in the French capital made international headlines and sparked panic after videos of the insects crawling on the Paris metro went viral online. As the outbreak drew widespread media attention, French officials pledged to take action against bedbugs, or “punaises de lit.”
Although the panic calmed down, Paris’s bedbug scare stoked fears about infestations during the Olympic Games, which begin on Friday, July 26. The boom in tourism and surge in crowds means more hosts for the bloodsucking pests.
The tiny, flat, parasitic insects feed on people’s blood at night while they sleep, per the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. While bedbugs don’t spread diseases, they can cause itchy bites, sleep issues and psychological distress.
The thought of bedbugs alone is a nightmare for most people, but are the pests still a cause for concern in Paris? Could there be a bedbug crisis during the 2024 Olympics?
Are bedbugs still a problem in Paris?
Bedbugs are found almost anywhere their hosts live. “The situation in Paris is the same as everywhere in the world. Where man goes, the bedbugs go since they move with us, ” Dr. Jean-Michel Bérenger, a medical entomologist and France’s leading bedbug expert, tells TODAY.com.
“They are domesticated and live in our homes,” Bérenger adds.
Infestations were common in many households up until the 1950s, when they all but disappeared due to advancements in pesticides, according to the National Pesticide Information Center.
In recent decades, there has been a global resurgence of bedbugs in urban environments, including major cities in the U.S. and Europe, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Factors include increases in travel and resistance to pesticides.
A 2023 study by the French Agency for Food, Environmental and…
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