Bedbug Complaints Up 70%

[AlHayatZween 2]

What's next?

The country is going to hell in a hand basket.

Boom in tiny bedbugs is causing big trouble

By Barbara Barrett, McClatchy Newspapers Barbara Barrett, Mcclatchy Newspapers Fri May 15, 5:50 pm ET

WASHINGTON — The biggest bedbug outbreak since World War II has sent a collective shudder among apartment dwellers, college students and business travelers across the nation.

The bugs — reddish brown, flat and about the size of a grain of rice — suck human blood. They resist many pesticides and spread quickly in certain mattress-heavy buildings, such as hotels, dormitories and apartment complexes.

Two shelters have closed temporarily in Charlotte, N.C. , because of bedbugs, a Yahoo chat group dedicates itself to sufferers and countless bedbug blogs provide forums for news, tips and commiseration. State inspectors say that more emphasis may be needed to tackle the creatures.

Federal officials have taken notice of the resurgence. Last month, the Environmental Protection Agency held its first-ever bedbug summit, and now a North Carolina congressman wants to take on the insect.

Democratic Rep. G.K. Butterfield just introduced legislation that would authorize $50 million that's already in the Department of Commerce budget to train health inspectors how to recognize signs of the insects.

The Don't Let the Bed Bugs Bite Act of 2009 also would require public housing agencies to submit bedbug inspection plans to the federal government. It would add bedbugs to a rodent and cockroach program in the Department of Health and Human Services . It also would require the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to research bedbugs' impact on public mental health.

Butterfield's letter to congressional colleagues about the legislation attracted lots of attention: It was topped with a full-color picture of the insect sitting on human skin.

"Unfortunately, in recent years, the United States has seen a resurgence in bedbugs," the letter reads. "That's right — they're back in the sack — and biting."

Bedbugs have hit hotels and homes in every state. The creatures are amazing hitchhikers, experts say, and easily travel in suitcases, boxes or packages. They can live for up to a year without food.

Apparently no state has a central reporting system for bedbugs, according to Butterfield's office, and since the bug carries no known diseases, many health departments don't consider it a public health threat.

That leaves the critters falling through the cracks among regulators, said Michael Potter , an entomologist at the University of Kentucky and one of the country's bedbug experts.

"Most health departments say, 'Hey, we don't deal with bedbugs,' " Potter said.

Those who've suffered outbreaks say that the anxiety it induces can be debilitating. Potter said many sufferers tossed out furniture and could spend thousands of dollars on repeated treatments from pesticide companies. They call him about anxiety, insomnia, shame and the incessant annoyance of itchy red welts on their skin.

"They're, like, ready to blow their brains out," Potter said. "It's emotionally distressing. Anyone that has never had a bedbug problem is not one to judge whether we're dealing with a medical, emotional public health issue."

In Congress , Butterfield first introduced his bill a year ago after hearing from a constituent who'd brought bedbugs into her home from a hotel trip. The bill died in committee last year, but Butterfield aides say they hope that higher attention will help the measure this year.

The co-sponsors include Reps. Don Young , R- Alaska , Ben Chandler , D- Ky. , Bobby L. Rush , D- Ill. , Betty McCollum , D- Minn. , Corrine Brown , D- Fla. , Steve Cohen , D- Tenn. , Brad Miller , D- N.C. , and Eddie Bernice Johnson , D- Texas .

Butterfield also has received support from the National Pest Management Association , which says that bedbug calls to pest control companies are up 70 percent in the past five years.

Greg Baumann , a Raleigh, N.C. , pest control expert and the vice president of technical services for the National Pest Management Association , said that a decade ago few pest control companies dealt routinely with bedbugs.

"Now it's everyone today," he said.

Baumann said companies could use pesticides on the bugs but that they also tried such alternatives as extreme heat, freezing and isolating the insects through mattress covers.

Since the EPA restricted the use of several effective pesticides in the 1980s, bedbugs have built resistance to the chemicals that now are on the market, said Potter, the University of Kentucky entomologist. Public education is important, he said, but the industry also needs a good insecticide.

"Whether that bill is going to solve the problem — certainly it's a start," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20090515...atchy/3234191_1

[Nagishkaw 510]

Soap and water is cheap. Maybe if folk washed their bedding often enough, they wouldn't have a problem. Nasty azzes.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Soap and water is cheap. Maybe if folk washed their bedding often enough, they wouldn't have a problem. Nasty azzes.

You could also let a pig loose in your room about an hour before you go to bed. The bed bugs will feast on the pig's blood and be too full to suck yours.

[Nagishkaw 510]

Then you are at risk of swine flu. Get out the bleach and do some laundry!

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Then you are at risk of swine flu. Get out the bleach and do some laundry!

Will bleach kill 'em?

[Nagishkaw 510]

Bleach kills just about everything.

[john & jean 37]

Bleach kills just about everything.

do not drink it....it won't kill em

Edited May 16, 2009 by john & jean

[Nessa 23]

i have never heard of them until charles said they had them in this hotel he stayed in korea.

[Sprailenes 47]

From someone who used to work in the hotel industry:

When you are staying in a hotel, doesn't matter where. Take the top cover off... NEVER USE IT.. it gets washed maybe 1-2 times per year.

As for bed bugs, strip your beds and look all over the mattress especially the seams. Then get your can of lysol out and spray that mattress down.

The sheets are the only things that get washed, and I have known housekeepers who sometimes don't change them if they don't look dirty... and I have worked at a Fairmont. It doesn't matter where you go... this stuff happens.

I just bring my own pillow, my own blankets and I ask for fresh bedding when I go to hotels so I can almost guarantee it is coming straight from laundry. It sounds uber ####### but I don't take chances with beds, you're sleeping there. It needs to be clean.

[Nessa 23]

I just bring my own pillow, my own blankets

most people cant bring that, when u travel on a business trip, for example, u wont be carrying blankets n pillows

[AlHayatZween 2]

From someone who used to work in the hotel industry:

When you are staying in a hotel, doesn't matter where. Take the top cover off... NEVER USE IT.. it gets washed maybe 1-2 times per year.

As for bed bugs, strip your beds and look all over the mattress especially the seams. Then get your can of lysol out and spray that mattress down.

The sheets are the only things that get washed, and I have known housekeepers who sometimes don't change them if they don't look dirty... and I have worked at a Fairmont. It doesn't matter where you go... this stuff happens.

Ewwwww!

There is apparently an bedbug epidemic here in NYC. Landlords won't even help fumigate unless the whole building is effected, because supposedly it is so expensive to get rid of them once you have them.