11/16/2011 Why Are Bedbugs So Difficult To Get Rid Of?

The moment you realize a single bed bug can spend up to a year without eating is the moment you likely realize why bed bugs are such hearty little creatures.

“They can sit around and just wait for someone to show up,” Karl Schiemann of Denver’s Department of Environmental Health said.

Once an unsuspecting victim does show up, that person stands a decent chance of walking away largely unaware.

“Only 30 percent of the population presents with a rash,” he said.

Add that to the fact that a bed bug’s eggs are incredibly small, and you’ve got a glimpse into the difficult world of bed bug eradication.

“They’re not like our normal pests,” Schiemann conceded.

Just last week, Denver Health Medical Center had to close a section of its Medical Intensive Care Unit until the area could be thoroughly cleaned after a patient showed up with a bed bug.

“When the bed bug was spotted, Denver Health followed procedure which includes mitigation in the immediate and surrounding areas. In addition to a thorough cleaning of the area, the mattress from the patient’s room was also discarded. The hospital then waited the standard amount of time and inspected the rooms and found no further bugs,” read a statement from the hospital.

“We see them all over the place,” Schiemann said. “I’ve seen them in some of the cleanest of places.”

Earlier this year, the pest-control company Terminix ranked Denver as the sixth-most bed bug infested city in the country.

Schiemann says the recent rise in bed bug issues nationwide is likely the byproduct of a number of circumstances, some known and some unknown. He does say the increase in international travel combined with a change in acceptance of one-time traditional pesticides, is likely responsible for a god chunk of it.

“We’ve changed the way we do pest control. We don’t spray every nook and cranny,” he said.

He says to keep an eye out for what look to be tiny ink spots. It can actually be bed bug excrement.

“It’s pretty common,” he said.

Continue Reading More/Watching Video: Why Are Bedbugs So Difficult To Get Rid Of?

10/31/2011 South Bend Indiana Apartment Residents Overtaken By Bedbugs

Trash bins overflowed with mattresses and furniture last month at a South Bend apartment complex. But anyone tempted to repurpose the loot would have been in for a nasty surprise.

The bedding and furnishings were infested with bedbugs.

The bugs had moved into several of the complex’s buildings and were “spreading like wildfire” from apartment to apartment, according to one resident, who didn’t want to be named for fear of eviction.

“I noticed the bites first and I was thinking, ‘I’m breaking out or I have the measles,’ ” she said. “But then I saw a little bug.”

She called the complex office and they sent Terminix to look at her place. They confirmed that she had the bugs.

So did her daughter and grandchildren, who live in a nearby apartment.

“They are bit up bad,” she said. “My daughter and her friend threw away everything.”

The family is sleeping on the floor until the problem is resolved.

Meanwhile, the woman is concerned that the bugs might spread through the complex’s schoolchildren.

“My grandson goes to school and other kids out here go to school,” she said. “They say (the bugs) can travel on people’s clothing or purses.”

She’s right. Bedbugs don’t stay put.

“They are the best hitchhikers there are,” said Tim Harvey, manager of Terminix’s South Bend branch.

“They ride from place to place on clothing, luggage. They can even get on your pants and travel from room to room or be transported anywhere.

“It has nothing to do with sanitation or cleanliness. They are just good hitchhikers,” he said.

They tend to infest places with a lot of traffic: college dorms, hotels and motels, nursing homes, office buildings, schools and day cares, hospitals, public transportation and movie theaters.

Last year, Hawthorne Elementary School in Elkhart dealt with an infestation. In August, the Niles Housing Commission’s Hi Rise apartments had to call in a company with a bedbug-sniffing dog to deal with an infestation. There have been several reports of bedbugs at hotels in Michiana. And, of course, there are homes.

“I’ve actually gotten double the calls this year than we did previous years,” said Harvey. “We probably do an average of two to three jobs per week.”

Science and health

Bedbugs are small, flat, oval insects that feed solely on blood, preferably that of humans. They are usually active at night and prefer to hide close to where people sleep – especially in the crevices of the mattress, box spring, bed frame and headboard. They cannot fly, but will crawl as far as 20 feet to obtain a blood meal, said Marc Lame, an entomologist at Indiana University Bloomington.

Bedbugs feed by piercing exposed skin like a mosquito. They are not able to burrow into skin or through material. It takes them about five to 10 minutes to feed, but people seldom know they are being bitten.

“Basically their whole survival depends on getting on, getting a blood meal and getting off without being squished,” Lame said. “They inject an anticoagulant to make the blood flow faster and an anesthetic so they can remain undetected.”

Some people develop an itchy red welt similar to a mosquito bite within a day to two weeks of being bitten, while others have little or no reaction.

Female bedbugs might lay 200 to 500 eggs during their lifetime. When they first hatch, the bugs are about the size of a pinhead. As they grow, they molt or shed their skin five times. Before each stage of the life cycle, the bugs must have a blood meal. However, they can go for months, as many as 10 to 12, without eating, Lame said. If conditions are right, they can mature within a month – which means they can produce several generations in one year.

While a lot of research is still being done on the subject, studies so far have shown that bedbugs do not transmit disease.

However, the government is beginning to recognize the bugs as a serious health concern. Just last year, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a joint statement on the matter. This is because the bugs have a psychological effect on people, Lame said.

“If you think you’re sleeping with bedbugs, you are not going to sleep very well,” he said. “Which causes you to function very poorly – from crazy to just darn tired.”

That, in turn, can impair reflexes and contribute to other health problems.

“After they get rid of (the bugs), it can take three weeks or three months for (a person) to psychologically get over the infestation,” Lame said. “I’ve even had some sleepless nights after bedbug calls that were heavily infested – where they were really numerous and gross.”

Some people become obsessed and would do anything to rid their homes or themselves of the bugs, including “dousing themselves with pesticides or bedbug bombs,” Lame said, or scraping their skin with sharp objects.

A North Carolina woman died after she and her husband used several chemicals in their home in an attempt to rid it of bedbugs.

“We could all have bedbugs and survive,” Lame said, but when it reaches an epidemic and causes anxiety in people, public health officials play an important role.

Continue Reading More: South Bend Apartment Residents Overtaken By Bedbugs

9/18/2011 Bedbugs Invade Imperial County California

More than 40 years after bedbugs were eradicated in this country with the use of strong pesticides such as DDT, the infamous bedbug is making a comeback across the country and biting its way into Imperial County.  

Bedbugs are about the size of an apple seed, said Sandy Fishell, owner of the extermination company Terminix of Imperial Valley.

The insect is flat, has no wings, it can’t jump but it can crawl very quickly like a cockroach, Fishell said.

In Imperial County, “we never had bedbugs,” Fishell said, adding she received her first bedbug job here in 2003.

After that, bedbug calls became more common, she said, and started “ramping up” about three years ago.

The county Public Health Department also saw a rise in complaints associated with bedbugs, deputy director Jeff Lamoure said.

In 2008 the department received three complaints associated with bedbugs — two from El Centro and one from Holtville — according to a report by the county Public Health Department.

In 2011 this number rose to 24 complaints and came from all cities in the county except Calipatria, according to the same report.

Most of this year’s complaints came from low-income extended-stay motels in El Centro, Lamoure said, adding that the area of State Street and Adams Avenue seems to be the most affected by bedbugs.

In 2009, Terminix got four bedbug calls a year, Fishell said. In 2010 that number increased to about two calls a week, she said.

There has been a steady rise of bedbug incidents in the county since 2008, said Gabe Cordero, president of Pestmaster Services.

But even with the rising number of cases, Cordero said he doesn’t believe bedbugs are an epidemic.

Still, it is quite an effort to bring bedbugs under control and eradicate them, he said.

The first cases of bedbugs in the United States started to reappear about 13 years ago, said Micah Nix, executive director of the National Bedbug Association.

But mapping an exact location of where and how the incidents started is difficult, Nix said, because such data wasn’t collected.

Even though it is unclear why there is a resurgence of bed bugs after all these years, Nix said, foreign travel and tourism are considered the main factors behind the resurgence.

Nowadays, “We have our own native colonies,” he said, “so we are responsible for spreading bedbugs across the country.”

Bedbugs live by sucking blood from hosts such as humans and are excellent hitchhikers, Nix said.

The insect can “hitch a ride pretty much to any location,” mostly by inanimate objects such as bags, luggage and furniture, he said.

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7/17/2011 Why BedBugs Won’t Be Stopped

Seems like everywhere you go someone in the media is talking about bedbugs. Most recently, a study compiled by Terminix, a pest control service company, ranked the top most infested cities in 2011. Among those in the study include: Cincinnati, Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia and, edging out all of the competition at number one, New York.

So, why are these little bloodsucking critters not going away? It would seem that with all the news stories, we as a public would know the precautions needed in place so that we don’t find ourselves battling a case of the bedbugs. Well, we would be mistaken.

Our bedbug problem has been around in large numbers since 2000. It has grown and effected more homes, offices, theatres, planes and retail establishments in 2010 than any previous year.

There are so many answers as to what we should do. Knowing that the information you receive from a pest control professional can vary due to experience and education, here are some things to keep in mind when calling a “professional.”

1. Are they licensed and insured?
2. Do they take the time to answer your questions and give you great customer service?
3. How are their online reviews? (Remember you can’t make everyone happy all the time.)
4. Do they have a guarantee on their work?
5. Can they supply you with the labels to the chemicals they are using upon arrival to treat your home or office? (In New York, it’s law, and you should research what they are putting into the atmosphere within your home.)

We can also take several pre-emptive measures to help place a barrier around our homes, offices and automobiles so that, if and when, we come in contact with bedbugs, they won’t hitchhike over to our place:

• Purchase mattress encasements. (They even have crib encasements now)
• Open packages from retailers (both on and off line) outside or in a garage.
• Be wise when you stay in a hotel. Watch my video on hotels and bedbugs here.
• Don’t bring used furniture into your home.
• Buy a bedbug spray that specifically says bedbugs on the can or bottle.

Number five on our pre-emptive measures checklist is one of the most important steps you can take to help keep the bedbugs out. Creating a barrier around your home, office and automobile is a triple threat cocktail to kill whatever comes into these areas.

Bedbug sprays come in all sizes and shapes. I recommend Pronto Plus® bedbug spray, as it’s effective in providing the coverage and barrier on the items you choose to apply it to and won’t leave you coughing for hours. Always research and find the solution that is right for your current situation and remember to read the labels of any product you spray or use in your home.

So now I ask you, why are bedbugs still growing in numbers all across America? We all have a responsibly to protect our families, friends and even our coworkers. Take the time to educate yourself about how these little critters work, especially if you are living in or visiting New York.

Continue Reading More: Why Bedbugs Won’t Be Stopped

7/5/2011 Cincinnati Ranks First In Bedbugs: Tops Orkin’s May List Of Bedbug Service Calls

7/1/2011 How To Protect Yourself Against Bedbugs This Summer

If you’re worried about encountering bed bugs this summer, or — poor you — you’re already coping with them, you’re in good company. One in five Americans has had bed bugs or knows someone who has, and 80 percent are afraid of encountering them in hotels, according to a survey by the National Pest Management Association. And for once, a public health panic is reasonably well-founded; bed bugs are indeed turning up in hot spots all over the country, with new infestations in major cities hitting the news with regularity.

I’ve been reporting on bed bugs for quite awhile. I’ve covered how to protect yourself from bed bugs when you travel, including a new spray product reputed to fend them off from hitching home in your luggage, and how to get rid of bed bugs if you are unfortunate enough to bring them home with you. I’ve even offered additional bed bug prevention tips for frequent travelers.  In fact, I’ve become something of a reluctant expert in the science of bed bugs and bed bug-prevention. So now I’m going to tell you what you really need to know about bed bugs that no one else is telling you.

1. Know Your Danger Spots. If your summer vacation is going to take you touring the National parks of the West or Southwest, you probably don’t have to take more than routine precautions against bed bugs. They really haven’t made it out to the hinterlands in great numbers yet. But if your summer travel is going to take you to a major cities, particularly one in the midwest or eastern seaboard, watch out. The list of contenders for the “top 10″ danger zones in constantly changing as new pest reports come in, but Cincinnati, New York, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and, perhaps surprisingly, Denver and Los Angeles consistently make the list. Boston and Baltimore made a recent list issued by pest management company Terminix, which also included Dallas and San Francisco for the first time. Other midwestern cities with major bed bug problems include Dayton, Cleveland, and Columbus, Ohio (in fact the entire state of Ohio is under siege, according to pest management experts), Indianapolis, Minneapolis, and Louisville, Kentucky. Another list added Houston and Las Vegas to the list of western cities newly introduced to the bed bug disaster. (Thanks to Terminix, Orkin, and ChemtecPest for these lists.) If you want to know how bad bed bugs are in your summer vacation destination, look it up in the bed bug registry, which keeps up-to-date reports which can even be searched by hotel. Warning: gross-out factor high. Be aware, however, that you may be looking at reports from a year or more ago, in which case the particular hotel may have cleaned up its act.

3. Travel Prepared. The last thing you want to do is arrive and start worrying about bed bugs. Take the worry out of travel by bringing protective supplies, including plastic bags to store your clothes in (those air-lock travel bags do double-duty by making extra room in your suitcase, as well as keeping bugs out.) Don’t be tempted to hang your clothes in hotel closets or leave them strewn over chairs, unless you’re 100-percent certain the room’s bug free; bed bugs are now known to favor upholstered furniture and yes, they can climb walls. Put your suitcase on a luggage rack and pull it out from the wall. If you’re going to New York, Ohio, or anywhere else where bed bugs are known to be, well, practically everywhere, you ca also bring a household remedy reputed to keep them at bay. (No guarantees here.) These can include Vaseline, which some say you use to coat the legs and rails of the bed so the bugs can’t climb up, and an herbal spray, Rest Easy, that promises to repel bed bugs. I travel with it and spray it around the edges of my suitcase and all over the luggage rack, just in case. Or you can take the extreme measure being recommended by some and bathe the bed rails, headboard, and the edges of the mattresses in a mixture of rubbing alcohol and floor cleaner. (Seriously, people recommend this but it smells so vile you’re probably better off staying home.) When I come home from a trip, I wash everything I’ve brought with me and dry it in a hot dryer and leave my suitcase stored in a plastic garbage bag for two weeks, also with “just in case” in mind.

There’s a lot more to say about bed bugs, but I’ve probably disgusted you enough for one day. More posts to come, including how to get rid of bed bugs once you’ve got ‘em. Still excited about that summer vacation? Just kidding.

 Continue Reading More: How To Protect Yourself Against Bedbugs This Summer

6/30/2011 Willis Introduces BedBug Infestation Insurance: Protection For Residential & Hospitality Industries

Bedbug infestations have led to itchy welts and insurance headaches during the past few years, which is why Willis Group Holdings P.L.C. announced Tuesday it will provide bedbug infestation insurance protection for hotels and residential industries.

The product also offers a crisis management component, which can help reduce damage to an organization’s brand and financial loss, Willis said in a statement.

“This program offers organizations a comprehensive approach to addressing the risks involved with this exposure—from tools to help prevent an infestation to coverage for the economic consequences, through crisis management and remediation,” said Brian Ruane, Willis North America’s national real estate and hotel practice leader, in a statement. “The program is intended to close a critical gap in most insurance policies.”

Willis’ BBIR product contains a range of solutions including coverage for the cost of decontamination, rehabilitation expenses and business interruption; crisis management services; and decontamination services provided by Orkin L.L.C.

Recently, Aon Corp.’s Aon Risk Solutions released its version of a bedbug insurance product and partnered with Terminix International Co. Ltd. and Global Excess Partners L.L.C.

Continue Reading More: Willis Introduces BedBug Infestation Insurance

6/14/2011 Insurer AON Launches BedBug Insurance Policy: First Of Its Kind For Hotels, Landlords & Companies

5/27/2011 How NYC Became Americas Most BedBug Infested City: Problem Has Plagued Hotels, Subways, Retail & Even NYPD Police Cars

It probably isn’t much of a surprise, but bedbugs are taking a bigger bite out of the Big Apple so far this year, according to one exterminator company.

For the second consecutive year, Terminix ranked the city first in the nation for bedbug infestations, edging out Cincinnati, Detroit, Chicago and Philadelphia.  (In better news for New Yorkers, a rival ranking by competitor Orkin ranked the city only the seventh worst for bedbug cases.)

Terminix’s city rankings are based on the number of customer complaints and infestations discovered by employees of the company’s 350 U.S. branches. The company wouldn’t release specific data on just how many bedbug complaints it gets, but it said the problem is multiplying.

Bob Young, an entomologist and Northeast and Midwest division manager for Terminix, estimated that he has logged two to three times more bedbug calls over last year, following high-profile cases in which bedbug invasions forced several Manhattan businesses to close temporarily.

Is any borough of New York more infested than the others?

“Manhattan,” said Young, who is based in New York. He the added: “Clearly, Brooklyn and Queens. The Bronx. Even in the rural areas. They’re all over the place. These things, they hitchhike.”

Business for bedbug exterminators boomed last year. Bedbugs start at $500 a room, and off-site fumigation of personal belongings can add another $1,000, Young told WSJ columnist Anne Kadet last year. High-end residential jobs involving art and antiques can cost as much as $20,000.

This summer projections for bedbug activity probably won’t help New Yorkers feel more at ease. ”It’s a larger and larger problem each day,” Young said. “College students seem to bring them home with them.”

Young, who has been with Terminix for 15 years, said he started seeing the critters hit New York in the early 2000s. Since then, complaints have risen ten- to fifteenfold, he said, as the public becomes more aware of their presence.

Last year, bedbugs shut down the flagship Niketown store on East 57th Street, the Hollister Epic store in SoHo and a Victoria’s Secret on the Upper East Side, among other locations. And the insects made a debut at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

This year? “They’re even in police-department squad cars,” Young said.

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5/24/2011 2011 Most Bedbug Plagued Cities List: NYC Takes Top Spot According To Pest Control Giant Terminix

New York, for the second year in a row, according to a study just released by pest-control giant Terminix. Not really a surprise, since NYC is a populous metropolis with well-publicized infestations everywhere from apartment buildings to businesses such as department stores, magazine offices, even Lincoln Center.

Terminix reports an increase in bed bug infestations in most states during the past year, in part because consumers are more aware and on the lookout for the tiny pests, Terminix entymologist Paul Curtis told me.

The company’s list of most bed bug-plagued cities, based on customer complaints validated by Terminix and infestations discovered during pest calls:

1. New York
2. Cincinnati
3. Detroit
4. Chicago
5. Philadelphia
6. Denver
7. Washington, D.C.
8. Los Angeles
9. Boston
10. San Francisco
11. Columbus, Ohio
12. Dayton, Ohio
13. Baltimore
14. Louisville, Ky.
15. Dallas

This is the second year Terminix has put out a list. Baltimore, Dallas and San Francisco appear on it for the first time this year, replacing Indianapolis, Cleveland and Minneapolis.

Bed bugs have always been around, especially since strong chemicals such as DDT were banned, says bug expert Curtis. But today, “People are more aware and communicating” about the issue,” though “there’s still a stigma attached to having bed bugs,” he says. Businesses such as hotels are loath to let customers know about infestations, because that would deter potential clientele. So it can be very difficult to gather accurate information on the extent of bed bug infestation.

I asked Curtis whether it’s true that you can get bitten in seats on planes, trains and buses or in theaters. “There’s no question,” he said. “This is an insect looking for a dark place with a human host, looking to get a blood meal” And bed bugs are “consummate hitchhikers,” moving around easily on people and in bags, he says. Plus, they inject an anesthetic when they bite, so you may not feel it. Some people don’t get bite marks, he says. In other cases, a bite may not show up for a few days, making it hard to tell where you got it.

What to do? Be really careful bringing traveling bags and clothes into your home, he says. “When I get home I put my clothes in a plastic bag. They go into the washer and then the dryer on high (heat kills bed bugs). I vacuum my luggage.”

In hotels, Curtis always strips covers off the mattress and inspects it and the area behind the headboard and under box springs for dark spots (bed bug fecal matter), blood (from a feeding), the bugs themselves (which can range from head-of-a-pin size to appleseed-like), or for rows of tiny eggs.

He does not use hotel drawers and keeps his luggage on a rack as far away from the bed as he can. Bed bugs like to “harbor close to their food sources,” he says. So watch out for beds and upholstered seating. If you want to get extreme, you can place suitcases in big plastic bags that zip closed and you can leave luggage in the bathroom, which is less likely to harbor bed bugs. “But there is no silver bullet” for eradicating them, he says. Heat, cold and multiple treatments are often tried, especially since bugs can lie dormant for a long time.

Terminix has a bed bug learning center online, with answers to many questions about the critters. Other pest control companies, such as Orkin, have posted tips for bed bug detection and treatment.

The good news is that bed bug bites generally don’t cause harm and that “30%-40% of people never have a reaction to them,” Curtis says. Many never realize they were bitten.

Prevention is the key to avoiding extensive and expensive treatments of homes and businesses (which can mean throwing out mattresses and replacing carpets). You also can look at bedbugregistry.com, which contains about 20,000 user-submitted reports, to see if any infestations have been reported at hotels where you’re planning to stay. I checked out a couple of fleabags where I have stayed (and one where I refused to check in because the room looked sketchy), and both had client reports of bed bug bites. In those cases, I was surprised to see how unsympathetc and unhelpful users say management was in responding to the issue.

Continue Reading More: 2011 Most Bedbug Plagued Cities List, NYC Takes Top Spot