Why are people freaking out about bedbugs?

In My Humble Opinion
41

Yeah, Americans do seem to irrationally freak out about microbes and organisms slightly-bigger-than-microbes-but-still-tiny. It makes me think of Lysol’s campaign to eradicate “every germ EVA!” I mean, obviously you have symbiotic digestive system flora you wanna keep, and besides that, a completely sterile existence would lead to an immature immune system.

Then again, I just watched a documentary on babies and this mother in africa (in like a hut in the middle of nowhere, so I’m not suggesting that most people in the developing world do this) wiped her baby’s ass on her knee, and then used something that looked like a corn cob to scrape the visible feces of her knee. No wonder people in those living conditions die of so many fecal-oral transmitted diseases.

So, there’s a happy medium to be reached between knee-feces and desperately trying to eradicate everything bigger than a micron in diameter from your kitchen counter. Antibiotic resistance and widespread allergies aside, I think we do better leaning towards the latter than the former.

42

If bed bugs spread so easily and so often … why have they not been a huge media story until 2010? That, in itself, is suspicious – if bed bugs were truly almighty, everybody would have them all the time with no hope of getting rid of them.

Bed bugs did get some limited media attention down here after Hurricane Katrina – there were some infestations in a very few Baton Rouge hotels that hosted evacuees. But after a few weeks, we never heard about the bed bugs again. If they were so insidious, they’d be rampant all over SE Louisiana even today.

43

Why now, and not before? What’s changed?

44

Statement from the CDC from August 2010.

Here is an interesting document from the Centers for Disease Control. The pamphlet confirms that there has been a large upsurge of bed bug infestations in recent years and concludes that the reason is not yet known. However the increase in infestation is real and expected to continue if protective measures are not taken.

45

Hmmm … I wonder if DDT can hop over the modern EPA and/or FDA hurdles and be brought back for a spell. From some of the online reading I’m doing, DDT is spoken of as the Magic Bed Bug Solution.

There’s no modern analog to DDT that can be used? I wonder if our local mosquito spraying has any effect on bed bugs … I mean, you don’t hear squat about this locally.

Thinking some more … our climate supports loads of vermin in people’s homes, no matter how clean. Maybe out native “domestic micro-fauna” fills up the niches bed bugs would ordinarily occupy?

46

If we were going to bring DDT back and just suck up the environment damage, I think it’d be much better used on malaria, which kills as many people in Africa as AIDS, than on freaking bedbugs.

47

I agree with you, but to nitpick, DDT is (and has always) been approved for malaria control. It has minimal environmental effects when used properly for vector control.

The problem is misuse of vector-intended DDT for agricultural use.

Also, the data I have seen show that the emerging bedbug populations are resistant to DDT. DDT resistance in bedbugs was noted in the 1950’s. Most of the real control though the 1970’s (which led to them being almost non-existent in developed countries) was due to malathion and other organophospate insecticides, not DDT.

48

I couldn’t imagine how a mouse could cause so much damage, till I got one in my flat. It always amuses me how people say “it’s just a mouse.” Oh good grief, they are so darn destructive. And sneaky and hard to catch.

The thing is WHY people shoud be concerned is this IS NOT a huge problem, for right now. But it has the potential to be.

The cost of getting rid of the bed bugs is high, and what makes it worse is the fact is you can get rid of them only to ride on the subway and have your home reinfected all over again.

A lot of non-apartment people can’t relate to this. Not only are you effected but your neighbors are and you can infect them.

For instance, it would cost me about 50 dollars to wash every one of my clothes, plus I’d have to pay to have my clothes dry cleaned, that can’t be washed.

Now if you have your own washer/dryer it’s only the cost of water and gas. Much less.

I mean how would you like to have a flat and live out of garbage bags for 18 months. Then when you finally are bug free, some neighbor brings in a mattress that was thrown out in an alley and you’re back to square one.

We don’t need to freak out but we need simple education.

Don’t take things out of the trash. Don’t buy second hand furniture. Wash all second hand clothes in HOT water and dry for an hour BEFORE bringing it into your flat. Check your mattresses weekly and change your sheets and wash them every day.

This way if you do get bed bugs you’ll get one or two which can be dealt with easily enough before they start laying eggs

As for me I know it’s just a matter of time. I see my neighbors dragging in used furniture. I’ve even seen a bunch of dicarded mattresse being thrown out in my buildings, so I’d say they’re probably in the building. I’m not freaking out but I am putting down the DE and preparing myself and looking out so when I get the bed bugs, I can stop them as soon as possible

49

mozchron

I don’t want this to sound like an attack on your lifestyle but I have some questions.

Do you avoid going to the movies or the theatre because of the bedbug risk?

Do you avoid hotel stays and taking vacations?

How many times a day do you worry about bedbugs?

What are your feelings about being a guest in a friend’s home?

What are your personal bedbug avoidance procedures upon checking in and out of a hotel?

50

OK. So from this, I am thinking that living in a single-family home on a good-sized suburban lot – in and of itself – lowers the risk considerably. And being far away from the Northeastern U.S. helps some, too?

Is something similar happening in large West Coast cities?

51

I believe the level of difficulty for exterminating them is overstated. Two years ago an overnight guest brought them into my house in his luggage. I stripped the beds, opened all the closets and dressers, used a couple Raid Fumigators in each room, and then vacuumed thorougly. I haven’t seen a bedbug since. Before anybody asks if they were bedbugs for sure; yes, I’m sure. I caught a specimen and used a dichotomous key to identify it.

52

No worries :slight_smile:

Yep, I do avoid movie theaters etc… because of the risk.

No, unfortunately as an academic I travel A LOT. I have a 30-45 minute room-check regime that I do in hotels (see below).

I don’t “worry” about bedbugs a set number of times a day. As part of my job and due to my professional experience, I am aware of them. If I am in a situation that has risk factors, I take appropriate precautions.

Don’t like it. Don’t like having guests in my home either. If I am a guest in another’s home, I try to discretely check for signs. If I am sleeping there, better believe i’ll check the bed/room (but not in the owner’s presence).

I have given this in a couple of other posts, but here is a summary of my travel regime again (i’m copying this from another post):

**If you are traveling, i would take measures to minimize the chance of picking them up. Any hotel can have bedbugs, even nice ones. You can pick up bedbugs anywhere, but you are far more likely to get them from a hotel than anywhere else.

Check your hotel online to see if there are any bedbug complaints. In the states, you can look up on bedbugregistry.com, i also use the various travel rating sites. As often as not, if you type the hotel name and “bedbug” into google, if there are complaints they will come up.

Don’t use a regular suitcase. I use a canvas duffel bag. When i get home, all my clothes and the bag are thrown immediately in the dryer for an hour on high to kill bugs and eggs.

If you must use a suitcase, bring a bag of food-grade diatomaceous earth with you (it must be food-grade, not from a swimming pool supply store - other kinds are inhalation dangers, and don’t inhale it in in any event!). When you pack to go home, sprinkle this liberally in the suitcase (and pockets) to help kill any hitchhikers (not guaranteed, but its something). Seal your suitcase in a plastic garbage bag on your way home. When you get home, unpack the bag directly into the dryer (see above) then immediately vacuum out the bag. It helps to scrub the bag with a brush to dislodge any eggs that may be in there.

When you check into your hotel room, put the bags in the tub until the room has been inspected. Bring along a flashlight and a magnifying glass. Strip the bed. Using the light and magnifier, check the mattress and boxspring carefully for bugs, skins, feces and eggs. Remove the headboard if possible and check behind it - this is a favorite spot. If you can’t remove the headboard, at least use the flashlight to see if anything is there. Check the junction of the walls and ceilings for bugs. Check behind pictures, mirrors etc… Don’t sit on couches etc… (or at least check them).

Do not unpack your bags into the dressers. Keep your bag elevated on the rack and live out of the bag. Even better, if you are using a duffel bag, keep it hung on the bathroom door hook. If i have to hang my clothes, i use my own wire hangers and hang them on the shower rod.

If you find bugs, make them move you. Not on the same floor! Bugs can move between rooms, or even up or down. I would demand to me moved to a different floor, at least 2 floors away (i.e., if i was on the 3rd floor, i would demand to be moved to the 1st or 5th - not the 2nd or 4th).**

53

When invited in to somebody’s house, do you actually tell them that you won’t sit down and take your coat off because you think their chairs may harbor bloodsucking parasites with poor social skills?

54

So if you go into a waiting area and there are only upholstered chairs, do you just stand?

55

I hang my coat.

I’ll sit in the chairs, but after discreetly checking them. You would be suprised how many people have non-upholstered furniture though (like a bar stool etc…).

Yes.

56

Thanks for tipping me off to that site. I did a quick-&-dirty comparison to compare New York City to the entire state of Louisiana.

New York City: 4490 bed bug reports
Louisiana: 50 bed bug reports (39 hotels, 11 residences)

That explains the lack of coverage down here. And those Louisiana figures (though I realize they aren’t complete) are presumably brought up some by the status of New Orleans as a tourist town.

I think our roaches just won’t abide bed bugs encroaching on their turf :smiley:

57

If you catch them early, they are not that hard to get rid of (although I wouldn’t recommend the fumigators, they can just drive them into the walls or into other rooms without killing them, and the fog often doesn’t reach all areas).

The problem is often people don’t recognize the problem until it gets BAD. Then it’s much more difficult.

And Marxx brought up a good point. its much easier to deal with an infestation in a detached home. If you really want to, you can go the nuclear option and have the house tented and Vikane fumigated.

Can’t do this in an apartment, and even if you get rid of your bugs you can be re-infested by a neighbor through no fault of your own. The ubiquity of apartment living is a major contributor to the NYC problem in my opinion.

58

Thank you mozchron, for posting all this information! I suspect I (hopefully past-tense) had bedbugs, because I was getting bites with allergic welts that I’ve never had before, in a new apartment. Whether they were already there or picked up in the moving truck, who knows. But since I was reacting to the bites in a way I’ve never reacted to any other bites before, I concluded it had to be bedbugs.

I was only getting bitten once every 10 days to 3 weeks, so I figured it was just one or two of the same gender. I spread DE all around and nothing for a couple of months, then was bitten again, twice, just a few days apart. I get really bad welts, and this time on my arm and neck, so it looked terrible and I got a little more freaked out than I had been before. So I bought mattress covers, vacuumed everything in the bedroom, moved the bed about 4 inches from the wall, washed all the linens and spread more DE all over.

I really want to avoid chemical pesticides. I have 4 cats and would have to relocate them for a couple of days if chemicals - especially pyrethrins - get put down. Oh, and I stopped killing the centipedes since I found out they eat bedbugs!

How often should I vacuum the baseboards and re-apply the DE?

59

Next to my coat? What if the hostess is putting coats on the guest bed?

60

heh.

I’d make an excuse and go put it in the car.