“Goodnight, sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite” was once the playful prevail of parents sending their children off to bed at night.
But now as fears grow that the creepy crawlies could come to infest London in the way they have done Paris, commuters are beginning to spot the insects on the Underground.
Isolated sightings have begun popping up all over social media since The Independent were told they could easily survive the two hour Eurostar journey.
One skin-crawling clip, viewed more than 1.7m times on TikTok, shows a small brown insect crawling up the trouser leg of somebody sitting on the Victoria line.
The terrified passenger wrote in the caption: “Minding my own business on the Victoria line, a f*****g bedbug is on my leg.
“Said he’d got a great deal on the Eurostar and wondered if I could take him home. No!! Sort it out, Transport for London.”
Another woman films herself stamping on a suspected bed bug after spotting it waiting on the platform at Kennington.
Londoners shared how they have not sat down on the tube for over a week with one user positing the horrifying notion that: “That single one has laid like 400 eggs on those jeans already!”
One itchy and paranoid Londoner jumped out of her bus seat at a sighting of a huge insect before being informed it was “just a cockroach”.
Sadiq Khan was asked about the issue by Joe Politics at Labour conference where he moved to reassure Londoners that TfL were taking steps to control any potential infestations.
Bed bugs are seen in hiding in seat material in Paris— (REUTERS)
He said: “I want to reassure those listening TfL have one of the best regimes to clean our assets on a nightly basis and we’re speaking to our friends in Paris to see whether there are any lessons to be learned.
“We don’t think those issues will arise in London, but no complacency from TfL.”
GPs have been offering advice to returning Irish and Scottish rugby fans who had been in Paris to watch their teams.
Dr Trish Horgan from Cork posted on X: “You did a super job supporting our boys in green. Now we ask you to do something to support the team at home.”
She urged anyone who is coming back home from France to ask a family member or a friend to put two large bin bags, one ziplock bag, and a towel in front of their house.
The next step is taking a scalding hot shower and scrubbing. After doing so, the contents of the toiletries bag should be washed in hot water. The bag should also be turned inside out and cleaned under hot water.
Footage of the blood-sucking insects has horrified TikTok users in Paris, leading to some avoiding the infested Parisian metro, or posting warnings about the creepy critters swarming all over their Airbnb rentals.
