Bedbugs have in recent weeks gone from being a subject of potential derision to a contentious political issue in France, with aghast citizens reporting seeing the creatures in locations including trains, the Paris metro and cinemas.
The aim of a meeting on Wednesday, which will see Transport Minister Clement Beaune host transport and passenger organisations, will be to"quantify the situation and strengthen the measures", his ministry said. Meanwhile, the head of President Emmanuel Macron's Renaissance party in the French National Assembly, Sylvain Maillard, said a cross-party bill would be put forward"at the beginning of December" to combat the"scourge" of bedbugs.
"What concerns me is that people do not get cheated by firms that make them pay 2,000 or 3,000 euros " to rid their houses of bedbugs, he added, denouncing"abuses" in the pest control sector.Bedbugs, which had largely disappeared from daily life by the 1950s, have made a resurgence in recent decades, mostly due to high population densities and more mass transit.
But the individual cases have not been confirmed by the authorities and RMC TV reported that a probe by Paris transport operator RATP had found no bedbugs on its services.