"The bedbug is a disaster for mental health"

A bed bug (illustration).

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• In Marseille, the subject of the bedbug is "particularly strong", according to the deputy LREM.

  It is the city where "Google occurrences on eradication are the most frequent".

• The elected regrets that today there is no coordination between "those who do scientific research on these little animals, those who manufacture the products and those who eradicate them".

• For Cathy Racon-Bouzon, the bedbug “is a real public health problem”.

How to permanently get rid of bed bugs that proliferate year after year in Marseille and France?

This Tuesday, at the end of the Marseille LREM deputy Cathy Racon-Bouzon submitted a report on the issue to the Minister of Housing Emmanuelle Wargon with a series of measures to fight against this significant phenomenon.

She returns for

on the stakes of such a question and her proposals for solving it.

How to explain the fact that bed bugs are a phenomenon that continues to grow?

It is a phenomenon that had somewhat disappeared in the 1950s but which is on the rise all over the world, in particular in Western countries where the observed upsurge has been enormous over the past five years.

In France, there is a real difficulty in dealing with bedbugs.

It goes through all the radars.

There is no surveillance phenomenon for this scourge, which is not measured like other subjects.

So, it is difficult to know the extent of the phenomenon precisely and reliably.

The observation that we make is an upsurge of converging testimonies.

For example, eradication professionals report 200,000 interventions in 2017 and 540,000 in 2019!

The subject is particularly strong in Marseille, where Google occurrences on eradication are the most frequent.

Precisely, this eradication poses a problem….

The problem is, not everyone is going in the same direction.

Everything is done in a somewhat spontaneous way, each in his corner.

Eradication professionals are people who were specialized in rat control, for example, and who, seeing that a need is being created, adds a string to their bow.

There is no background training for this or certification.

As a result, today, there are people in the industry who are very good as well as others who are less well, scams like people who sincerely think they are doing well!

On the other hand, the scientific knowledge about bedbugs is in the hands of medical specialists.

And there is a lack of overall coordination by the public authorities between the two.

Everyone develops their methods in their own corner.

On the contrary, it would be necessary to create a doctrine of national intervention validated by the State, a kind of religion, a protocol on which everyone agrees.

This body would make it possible to bring together all the players around the table, instead of having each in his corridor those who do scientific research on these little animals, those who manufacture the products and those who eradicate them!

Why do you think the bedbug should be recognized as a public health problem?

This recognition has no normative value, but it then allows the problem of bedbugs to be included in national plans, and gives prerogatives to regional health agencies to act.

However, this is a real public health problem.

The bedbug is a disaster for mental health, with sleep disturbances, anxiety, post-traumatic syndromes linked to disinfection, social isolation.

The Ministry of Health must now approve this data to unblock certain situations.

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• Marseilles

• Insect

• Health

• Society