“Paris is battling a major bedbug infestation, with reports of the bloodsucking pests being spotted in […] cinemas, on trains, and at Charles-de-Gaulle Airport,” reported Business Insider at the end of September.

“French authorities are under pressure to tackle the problem ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympics, which is due to take place next summer.”

On October 13, Condé Nast Traveller reported, “The infestation began just before Paris Fashion Week (yes, these bugs have good taste), when reports broke of increased sightings of the insects in homes, cinemas, trains and even hospitals.”

According to the magazine, the upsurge is down to the revival in international travel – Paris is the world’s most-visited city, with 44 million tourists in 2022 – and the increasing ineffectiveness of insecticides.

Japan gets rude reminder of evils of overtourism as visitors return en masse

It wasn’t long before the travel-loving critters had citizens on the other side of La Manche trembling in fear. Under the headline, “It’s like Covid with legs – how the Paris bedbug outbreak sparked a London frenzy,” The Standard newspaper reported that “Londoners say they’re avoiding the Tube and considering working from home as pest control specialists warn the bugs are perfectly capable of surviving the two-hour Eurostar from Paris to King’s Cross.”

Authorities in Seoul, South Korea, were also quick to point the finger at travellers arriving from Paris.

On November 8, The Guardian newspaper reported, “South Korea’s government has declared war on bedbugs, amid reports that an infestation is causing panic in a country that had practically rid itself of the nocturnal bloodsuckers.

Bedbug infestation fears in Hong Kong spark panic buying of insecticides

“Authorities will carry out inspections of ‘vulnerable’ locations – including public bathhouses and lodging facilities – and immediately disinfect places where the bugs are found.

“The four-week campaign comes as confirmation that the outbreak, thought to have originated in France in September, is taking hold in South Korea.”

On the same day, an RTHK report quoted Caspar Tsui Ying-wai, executive director of the Federation of Hong Kong Hotel Owners, as suggesting that although invasions were happening throughout Southeast Asia – he singled out Singapore and Indonesia – “Hong Kong is not suffering as badly, but hotels are keeping a close eye on the matter in case this changes.”

That was contradicted by an angry review posted on TripAdvisor all the way back in August, under the headline “BED BUGS and a hotel in denial”, which accuses a Hong Kong Island property – which shall remain nameless in this column – of denying it had an infestation.

“They need an exterminator and pest control as it is a serious and disgusting problem,” wrote the visitor from Germany, who claims she had to pay €150 (US$162) to have her clothes dry-cleaned before leaving the city because the hotel refused to do so.

Hong Kong to review bedbug prevention plans of airlines flying from high-risk areas

So, are we really under assault by “Covid with legs”?

We’re not convinced. Firstly, like nits, bedbugs are unpleasant and annoying but hardly represent a public health emergency – and are not even an indication of a lack of hygiene.

Secondly, bedbugs have always been around, and on the move – in 2010, for example, a Post Magazine article told us, “Bedbugs have made an alarming return to New York, invading some of the city’s most expensive apartments, and Hong Kong is starting to see its own increase in infestations” as a result of bankers flying between the two cities.

Could it just be that the “outbreaks” around the globe are being exaggerated by media trained to pounce on the next big scare? Because we’re certainly not seeing a threat on par with other current concerns, such as war, climate breakdown – and indeed Covid-19, which continues to ebb and flow.

Follow the advice if you wish – use hard-case luggage, seal your clothes in plastic bags, inspect your hotel room for bedbug faeces – but don’t panic. And don’t let the fear of being bitten by bedbugs affect your holiday or place strain on your business trip.

Far worse things could happen.

Bougainvillea in full bloom in China’s Guangdong province

At this time of year, the bougainvillea is in full bloom in Guangdong province and, according to the GD Today news site, the most romantic place in which to witness the spectacle is Guangzhou’s Maling Botanical Garden.

In the tourist-friendly north of Huadu district, the 12 sq km garden – which will be free to enter until December 12 (although a reservation must be made on the garden’s WeChat account) – is planted with more than 3,000 varieties of flowers and provides camping and a range of activities.

Don’t be surprised to encounter parades of people wearing traditional hanfu garb.

Melbourne to see birth of new hotel sub-brand StandardX

X marks the spot … in the Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy that in February will witness the birth of a new hospitality sub-brand.

Rumour has it that The Standard, a hotel brand that is already 24 years young, will soon have a bratty sister, StandardX. And the first outpost will have the seemingly contradictory brief of “capturing something brazen, new and surprising” while taking “inspiration from Fitzroy’s 70s and 80s heyday, when artists like Nick Cave, Ollie Olsen, Stuart Grant and Rowland S. Howard established the Little Band scene and created a hotbed of creative energy where experimental art, music and culture flourished”.

It’s not clear where future Xs might pop up but we’re told they will be in neighbourhoods “thrumming with cultural pulses” where “esoteric worlds of art, fashion and music scenes” collide.

A real coup, we reckon, would be to have the surviving members of Cave and Howard’s old band, The Birthday Party, reform to play at StandardX’s own birthday party.