THERE have been thousands fewer pest control visits to St Helens homes after the borough recorded high levels of rat infestations during the pandemic.

With people spending more time at home during covid lockdowns, St Helens Council experienced an eight-year high of 4,063 callouts for rat infestations.

The council believes that this is because people created more household waste while spending more time at home, and improvements have been made as there have been thousands fewer pest control visits since this period.

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Pest control visits in St Helens

A previous Star article highlighted that there were 2,729 reports of rat infestations in St Helens borough in 2019, 2,816 in 2018, and 2,274 in 2017.

Since this period, the council has revealed that the number of pest control callouts for domestic rat issues was 2,882 between April 2019 and April 2020.

The highest callouts of the past eight years came between April 2020 and April 2021 with 4,063 visits, which declined to 3,647 visits between 2021 and 2022.

The number of pest control visits for rats has further decreased to 2,777 visits between 2022 and 2023, and 2,297 between 2023 and 2024.

The council was also called out 13 times for domestic bedbugs and three times for cockroaches in 2021.

This number increased to 15 visits for bedbugs in 2022 and then decreased to three visits last year.

The number of cockroach visits decreased to 2 visits in 2022 and there were no recorded callouts last year.

Young family's rat horror

Last year, the Star reported on a young family who shared the horror of living in a row of rat-infested properties.

The disgust from the infestation had a lasting mental impact on the family, and they had to take their young son out of nursery because of the "horrible smell" that lingered from the vermin.

Rat and rodents can also cause significant structural damage to homes, with gnawing often leading to condensation, damp, flooding, and even fire risks.

The council's pest control team were called out to deal with the young family's vermin problem, and it explained the reasons why it believes there were high number of rodent callouts during the pandemic.

Covid a factor of high rodent callouts, council believes

A St Helens Borough Council spokesperson said: "During the two years of restrictions we all faced as a result of Covid measures it saw an increase in call outs for residential pest control support.

"We believe this is as a result of households creating more waste than usual due to the significant restrictions which kept many more people at home than usual, which is a common attraction for pests.

"With the closure and restrictions on many businesses during this time the pest population would also have looked for alternative sources of food, which drove higher numbers to homes.

"There were also restrictions on private contractors being able to work at that time which may have caused more people to come to the council's services."