While throngs of bugs rushing out from all directions and overrunning everyone in sight is a common horror movie trope, the present bedbug infestation in France has produced real-life footage that is no less harrowing.
After videos of bed bugs everywhere from hotels to the metro and Charles de Gaulle Airport started to emerge on social media and prompt both local and visitor complaints, Paris Deputy Mayor Emmanuel Grégoire sounded the alarm for the need for an "urgent action plan [...] against this scourge as France is preparing to welcome the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2024."
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Even as Transport Minister Clement Beaune and other officials at the highest levels of French government are preparing to meet over the issue, tourist videos of bed bugs at hotels and Airbnb (ABNB) -) properties are creating terrible PR for a city that welcomes more than 30 tourists every year and is preparing for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games.
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Here's what's going on with the bed bug problem
"When Paris makes sure you don't sleep lonely," travel influencer Rosie of Gap Year Travel posted over a video of multiple bed bugs on a pillow. "Be careful in Paris!!! There is a bed bug infestation problem."
"When we got into an Airbnb and found a bedbug infestation but at least we are in Paris," another traveler named Elle writes in a video of her and a friend smiling warily in a Parisian cafe posted on TikTok.
While numbers from French government agency ANSES show that 11% of French households had bedbugs at some point between 2017 and 2022 (this number is at least 20% in the U.S.), the creepy crawlies' growing resistance to insecticides have pushed the problem to new proportions over the last year.
Similar footage of bugs crawling out of seats from the Paris Metro trains have also pushed some travelers to say how they now "only stand" when taking the train to not accidentally be bitten by the blood-sucking creatures. Locals have had even bigger problems as many families reported having to throw out all their furniture and feeling embarrassed to tell their family and friends after finding infestations inside their homes.
French authorities are saying 'no one is safe' but here's what you can do
"It's an endless nightmare, I have no life left," a Paris resident named Émilie told French broadcast station BFMTV. She has been off work since February to combat the infestation.
In interviews with French television stations, Grégoire said that the infestation was not something caused by the cleanliness of any one hotel or transportation system but a wider problem in the country this summer and fall season.
"You have to understand that in reality no one is safe, obviously there are risk factors but in reality, you can catch bedbugs anywhere and bring them home," he told local station LCI on Sept. 29.
