Effective pest control supports disease prevention, community wellbeing and business resilience, yet it has a low to non-existent profile in the public health workforce. Factors including rising poverty, Awaab’s law and global warming point to the need for a radical rethink, argues Will Hatchett

Journalists love pests and invasive species because they make good copy. What could be better, on a slow news day, than reports of malarial mosquitoes or killer Asian hornets sighted in southern England or ‘super rats, the size of dogs’, threatening to chew through bathroom doors, during a bin strike on a sizzling bank holiday? How about a sharp-toothed piscine horror called ‘Sid Fishious’ raging through our rivers and canals? Such stories are the lifeblood of local and national papers.

Each year, Pest Awareness Day, on 6 June, provides a great opportunity for the professional bodies, and journalists, to shed a more sober, well-informed light on the topic. The British Pest Control Association (BPCA) coordinates UK initiatives for the international event. Niall Gallagher, its technical and compliance manager – a man who loves his job – reveals: ‘I always look forward to World Pest Day, because it’s the only day we really get to shout about what we do.

The service, like environmental health, is under-appreciated and has an image problem. Like environmental health, it is invisible if done well. Unseen, stereotyped and unacknowledged, it underpins huge areas of the UK economy, public health and national resilience. Gallagher says:  “If you look at public health campaigns, you’ll have obesity, healthy eating, all of these different things. But you can’t do any of those if you don’t have pest control in place. You can’t encourage healthy eating if we’re not protecting food stocks, if we’re not protecting supermarkets.”

BCPA’s report for this year’s World Pest Day, No Small Matter, notes that the sector contributes an estimated £1 billion in gross value to the economy each year. It is often perceived as a reactive service, but much of its work is preventative and hard to quantify. Routine inspections, monitoring, proofing and advisory services reduce risk before it escalates, protecting the food supply, safeguarding healthcare environments and homes and supporting business continuity. Pest control even improves wellbeing, as pest activity in people’s homes can contribute to anxiety, sleep disruption, stigma and isolation.

Escalating pressures

It would be wrong to suggest a service in crisis. UK pest control is highly effective, as evidenced by low incidences of illness caused by rodent-borne vectors, such as leptospirosis and hantavirus. But the BCPA’s 2026 report indicates escalating pressures on pest control, which should cause concern. It calls for specific policy responses.

The report notes that pest prevalence is closely linked to overcrowding, poor and insecure housing and constrained family budgets. Those living in multi-occupancy housing, tower blocks and supported living environments are more likely to experience persistent infestations. Local authority callouts for rodent infestations rose by over 150 per cent between 2022 and 2024.

Yet access to support is increasingly uneven. More than half of councils no longer provide a direct pest control service, and free rodent control, once the norm, is now almost non-existent. The lack of access to pest control can lead householders to resort to DIY measures that are cruel to animals and may involve the use of illegal rodenticides. Meanwhile, the sector is suffering from a recruitment challenge, owing to its ageing workforce.

A science-led, non-profit trade body, the BCPA has 750 member organisations and more than 3,500 individual professionals. This equates to almost half of the estimated size of the pest control sector. Pest control has changed immeasurably in the last few decades, reflecting our more sophisticated awareness of ecosystem interdependence and the malign effects of persistent chemicals. This is communicated in the BCPA’s professional codes and assured standards, which are aligned to the World Health Organization’s One Health concept.

One Health approach

A ‘one health’ approach dictates that pest control should address the root of the environmental and ecological factors that allow pests to thrive, rather than relying solely on chemical pesticides. It requires destroying pest breeding sites, introducing natural predators and sharing data to predict pest outbreaks.

Gallagher explains that the use of environmentally damaging anticoagulant poisons is now tightly regulated by law. He says: “Pest controllers are heavily restricted on their use of anticoagulants. If we want to put an anticoagulant outside a building, we have to fill out a risk assessment and justify why other methods can’t be used.”

Good practice in integrated vector management focuses on three elements: proofing (preventing access points), housekeeping (effective hygiene and waste management) and stacking (removing the clutter and debris that attract pests). Gallagher says: “The control of an animal is always the last step. The idea would be that we would never have to control any pests, because we would have a system in place that would manage the population to the point it’s no longer an issue.”

We don’t live in that world. Sewers and drains aren’t sewer-proof and are often compromised; householders have little or no awareness of how to make their homes rodent-proof. Drainage and utility contractors provide vector pathways, and home adaptations, such as extensions and decking, are often a boon to mice and rats. There is virtually no national or local public health education on the relatively simple measures needed to keep mice and rats outside.

Links with environmental health

As pest control evolves and builds its knowledge base, the BPCA has been developing and increasing its links with universities and environmental health courses. Gallagher lectures environmental health students. He says: “I’ve developed a huge amount of respect for EHOs – how much they have to learn, all the different disciplines, all the politics and policies they have to manage.”

BCPA member and pest control practitioner Fergal Flynn is a good example of a professional who bridges both domains. Flynn chose to join his family’s pest control business in Lincolnshire after completing his environmental health degree at Cardiff Metropolitan University. A BPCA member, he serves as a representative of its Academic Relations Working Group (AWRG) and frequently speaks at events and creates content for digital forums and continuing professional development.

Flynn believes pest controllers and EHOs can mutually benefit from better understanding each other’s work and that public health problems cannot be tackled effectively in professional silos. He says: “To understand a system, you have to understand all the components.” He particularly enjoys the problem-solving element of pest control. It combines hands-on work with the need for the scientific and technical knowledge required for effective diagnosis and treatment. His work ranges from small domestic jobs, including wasp control, to major commercial contracts, such as dealing with pigeon infestations in large hotel developments. Every rodent infestation, he says, is different. It can call for anything from a simple repair to major investigative work, involving drains, cameras and excavation. Flynn lists the wide range of tools and equipment that he carries in his van. It includes shovels, concrete, drain cameras, borescopes, thermal-imaging equipment and drain-unblocking tools.

New kind of public health professional

In many ways, the work he describes is what environmental health used to be like, up to the 1970s. In those days, councils were relatively well funded. Dedicated environmental health services employed generalist, locally-based teams. Their work included inspecting abattoirs and regulating the smelly trades associated with rendering animals, as well as street-by-street contact tracing for infectious diseases. Familiar with fleas, lice and bed bugs, they were directly responsible for fumigating houses and sewer baiting, often with highly toxic chemicals.

Flynn’s argument for the public health role of pest control is timely, given the increasing prevalence of budget-strapped families living in poor-quality housing. The inclusion of pests and vermin in the Housing Health and Rating System, and as a trigger for compulsory action under Awaab’s law, will require upskilling in housing management and enforcement. Meanwhile, concerns about insect and bird disease vectors, driven by a warmer, wetter climate, mean that pest control will increasingly require entomologists and experts in animal biology and behaviour.

The BPCA is keen to break down stereotypes and to improve diversity among new entrants into pest control. Long term, it’s in favour of an industry-led licensing framework. Its Pest Awareness Day report calls for greater cooperation between environmental health and pest control services, as well as the development of new training pathways.

Flynn counts himself fortunate that he chose to work in his family’s business after completing his environmental health degree. He’s not stuck behind a desk, and no day is the same. He’s a great advert a new kind of public health professional.

Public health directors never leave their town hall offices to pest-proof houses or peer into sewers or storm drains. Perhaps they should. Ill health associated with poverty and slum housing is returning, and climate change means that birds and insects are bringing new dangers. Pest control is not an add-on or an adjunct to public health – it is public health. Better collaboration and more professional cooperation can only improve the UK’s business efficiency and increase national resilience.