Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe SYDNEY, Feb. 3 (UPI) -- Australian entomologists say a plague of bedbugs threatens the country's hotel industry. Stephen Doggett of the Westmead Hospital Department of Medical Entomology tells the Australian Broadcasting Corp. that a change in cockroach control methods is partly to blame. In the past, hotel rooms were sprayed with a general insecticide that got rid of everything else along with the roaches, but now exterminators use "highly specific baits" that work only on roaches. Advertisement Tourists and business travelers from exotic places sometimes come to Australia accompanied by their local pests, adding to the problem. Doggett said the industry has to start paying attention to bedbugs. "They don't want to admit there's a problem for fear of actually losing money, but by doing this, the problem's actually getting worse and money's not being funneled back to look at the best strategies to control the bed bugs," he said.
