A live blood-sucking bug of a species native to the southwestern United States was found in 2025 in a five-star hotel room in Lisbon. This is the first confirmed case of an insect of this family, the triatomine bugs, found alive anywhere in Europe.
The incident involved a couple from the east coast of the United States who stayed at the hotel. The couple spent a night in a comfortable room located on the tenth floor and woke up with an unexplained dark mark on their arm and a finger.
After waking up with the marks on their bodies, the couple only managed to identify the source of the lesions hours later. They then found a blood-filled triatomine bug, resting calmly on the headboard of the room's bed.
Triatomine bugs are hematophagous insects, meaning they feed on blood. The discovery raises questions about how an insect native to North America could appear in a European hotel and represents an unprecedented case in Europe.
