Pest Controllers have issued a warning after seeing a 30 per cent surge in bed bug cases in an Essex city following widespread chaos across Britain and France.
Southend is "too far gone" and a "disaster zone", according to experts who have blamed the invasion on being a commuter destination.
Since the summer, cases of bed bugs infesting properties in the seaside city have risen by a third.
A widespread infestation firstly affected Paris followed by London, with many of the cases being on public transport.
Southend City Pest Control's Managing Director Kirk Day said the growing infestation issue in the area is likely due to commuting on public transport, especially in and out of London.
"I think we are too far gone, it is at the point where it's going to be very hard to get it back to how it was a few years ago," he told EssexLive.
"It is a bit of a disaster zone at the moment. You have people infested via public transport, second-hand furniture, HMO properties, and care homes.
"We are working with Essex and Southend Council and trying to provide them with advice on houses – it is more so trying to get them to deal with the wider issue."
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Day added that staff have had to increase their working hours since July by starting and finishing earlier to kill the critters.
He also revealed the worst infestations are where people have picked it up from someone else which causes continuous re-infestation and cross-contamination.
"It is not from the point of cost. That is why people generally see how bad it is and how it is going to affect them financially," he said.
"It is when it gets into wallpapers, skirting boards, really embedding themselves into those cracks and crevices, it then becomes a bigger issue.
Southend City Pest Control's Managing director Kirk Day said the growing infestation issue in the area is likely due to commuting on public transport, especially in and out of London
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"From a business point of view, we want to be called out for issues, but obviously we don't want there to be a massive epidemic of it, otherwise our job becomes a lot harder.
"If you are doing multiple bed bug issues, especially in the same building, the chance of us getting it under control quickly is massively reduced.
"This means more visits, customers are not going to be happy because it costs more and eventually we would get more bad reviews purely because of the place getting re-infested, but could look like we are not doing our jobs correctly."
