Parisians have been ordered to get rid of rats in their homes and businesses or face prosecution under an official campaign to fight a plague of rodents.

Less than a year after the animated cartoon Ratatouille turned Rémy the French rat into a loveable culinary hero, the city's residents have been ordered to eradicate his real-life counterparts. They are also being asked to denounce insalubrious neighbours responsible for the infestation.

With Rattus norvegicus causing disease, outrage and even union unrest, the authorities have told Parisians to put down poison, clear up their rubbish and block their cellars. “We run a campaign against rats in the city every year, but this year we really want to put a lot of energy into it,” Jean-Roch Gaillet, head of veterinary services in the Paris region, said.

“We're all very motivated because we have to try to reduce the rat population in Paris. We're putting up big posters informing people of the problem and what to do about it.”

A two-month advertising campaign, which began yesterday, is advising inhabitants to report brown rats to the police. Officials want them to identify neighbours whom they believe to be the source of the plague.

Rat inspectors will follow up sightings and order home and business owners to kill the rats themselves or to bring in modern version of the rat-catcher, below, at a cost of up to €8,000 (£6,300). Property owners will also be told to fill in holes that let the rodents emerge from the sewers, which are their usual home. Failure to follow the rat inspectors' instructions could result in a fine of between €90 and €750.

Paris Council has created its own anti-rat team, Service Municipal d'Actions de Salubrité et d'hygiène - nicknamed Le Smash - to exterminate the rodents on public property.

Although the French are not yet panicking at the thought of another Black Death, officials are concerned about the impact of the rats on public health and the city's image. “These animals are dirty, they carry germs and bacteria,” Catherine Perry, deputy head of veterinary services in Paris, told Le Parisien. “The main thing is they carry leptospirosis” - a disease that can cause fever, muscle aches and, occasionally, death.

Officials estimate the total number of rats in the French capital at eight million - or four rats for every Parisian. “The number has not gone up, but it's not going down either and that's what worrying us,” Mr Gaillet said.

With its restaurants, food shops, courtyards and cellars, and with the Seine running through the city, Paris - like London — is a rodent's paradise. “Every day we get a complaint because someone has seen a rat in a shop window or one running across the floor of a restaurant,” Mr Gaillet said. “It's not acceptable and it's not very good for tourism either.”

This month employees of Ed supermarket, in north Paris, demonstrated over what they claimed was an infestation in the shop by making a pile of dead rats and mice on the pavement outside.

In January the angry residents of a council estate, also in north Paris, held a march to protest at “rats in the bins, corridors and on our doorsteps”.

Pest control

— 1.2 million rats were killed in the northeastern Indian state of Mizoram last year after the fruits of a wild bamboo that flowers every 48 years attracted a plague of rodents and threatened famine. The Government paid two rupees for each rat tail

— Preparations for the 2012 Olympics were blamed for a plague of rats in London last year. Urban development, coupled with summer floods drove rodents above ground. Demand for Rentokil, the UK's largest pest control company, rose by more than 25 per cent

— There are between 65 and 80 million rats in Britain - at least one rat per person. There were only 45 million a decade ago

— A state of emergency was declared in Peru last year after a heatwave encouraged bumper rat litters, which cost the country more than £2.5million

Source: Times archives

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