“We have done a month’s work in the last three days,” Pazos said. “The amount of work we have right now is unbelievable.”

He backed the view of Yuen Ming-chi, a former head of the government’s Pest Control Advisory Section, that bedbugs were common in the city.

“Hong Kong is like Disneyland for bedbugs … because it is so dense, there are lots of places for them to lay eggs but also move from person to person,” Pazos added.

Bedbugs are small, oval-shaped parasitic, nocturnal bloodsuckers and their bites can cause rashes.

Bedbugs appeared on international radar screens after large-scale outbreaks in South Korea, Paris and London as international travel picked up in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Hong Kong e-commerce platform Shopline said it had a 172-times increase in sales of pest control and bedbug-killing products over the Singles’ Day shopping festival at the weekend.

One retailer hit HK$2 million (US$256,000) in sales in one day, with its top-seller an anti-bedbug travel kit.

“This demonstrates the significant level of concern among Hong Kong citizens regarding the widespread bedbug issue and their proactive approach in acquiring appropriate products to prevent infestations,” a Shopline spokesman said.

Hong Kong lawmakers call for more precautions to avoid spread of bedbugs

Henry Cheng Kwok-hang, a consultant at Ivy Pest Control Corporation, said the firm had also seen an increase in bedbug call-outs.

“We’d normally have eight to 10 a month, but we’ve had 20 already this month,” he said.

Cheng put down the increase in business to raised awareness, not because there were more bugs between the sheets.

He said most of the requests involved people in densely populated districts such as Kwun Tong, Kwai Chung, Wong Tai Sin and Tuen Mun.

Yuen agreed a bedbug problem had existed for decades in Hong Kong, but because of recent reports in the media and viral content online, people had become more aware of them.

He added authorities should concentrate on prevention of an outbreak next spring, when bedbug eggs would hatch during humid weather.

“From November, Hong Kong will become cooler and the humidity will decrease, so it is not a suitable climate for many insects, including bedbugs,” he said.

Yuen said authorities should try to tackle bedbugs just before the weather became hot again, as they did with mosquitoes.

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

He insisted that the public did not have to be too worried and that good hygiene and careful checking of items brought from infected areas should be enough to avoid an infestation.

“Insecticide powder and liquid available over the counter are effective in killing bedbugs if used correctly,” Yuen said. “Nevertheless, the application should be carried out by professional pest control operators who have experience in searching infested sites.”

A spokesman on Monday said that no bedbugs had been found at the airport.

Cathay Pacific Airways, Hong Kong Airlines and Korean Air said that they had drawn up contingency plans and stepped up cleaning and disinfection on their planes.

The three carriers added that no bedbugs had been found on their aircraft.

The MTR Corporation disinfected carriages of an Airport Express train last weekend. No bedbugs were found, although a photograph earlier circulated online showed what was later identified by an expert as one of the insects on a train seat.