They’re bloodthirsty, nocturnal and easy to bring home, and they're threatening homes and businesses across the UK. Yes, the bed b...
Case Studies
“I saw one on my bed, but I didn't know what it was,” said Rebecca Yates. Then came the bites, two or three in a row on her arm, that Yates noticed mid-morning. She said they were swollen bumps, like a mosquito bite. “It was maybe a couple of weeks later, somebody at work mentioned kind of jokingly, 'Maybe you had bed bugs?' And I had to ask, 'What is that?',” she said.
Yates didn’t think bed bugs really existed. She thought they were just part of a children’s nursery rhyme. However, an Internet search confirmed the red flat insect she had seen on the bed inside her flat was a bed bug. The pests had come into her living space through a neighbouring unit. Her neighbour had identified a bed bug problem months before, but failed to disclose it to fellow tenants.
Pest control managers across the North of England have noticed a bed bug explosion in recent years. Enquiries about bed bugs are up more than 50 percent, and the infestations are occurring in a variety of places – high-end hotels, suburban homes, college dormitories, apartments, even hospitals.
The exact reason for a bed bug resurgence is unclear, but the local trend reflects a worldwide increase in activity. The rise in international travel, lack of public awareness, and changes in pest control management are also factors.
In the 1950s and 1960s, the pesticide DDT was widely used to rid us of household pests. It was then eliminated from use due to concerns about its effects on the environment and health. Today, bed bugs have developed a resistance to most insecticides.
“Bed bugs are hitchhikers,” said Pete Jameson of Dynamic Pest Control in Cheshire. He cites the example of someone who’s gone to the USA, stayed in a hotel, and brought bed bugs back in suitcase. That person carries them into their house, then carries the pest to work.
“That’s our next fear factor. There are some places we know, like office settings, that are going to have problems with these. It’s just spreading rapidly,” he said.
Part of the problem is the time it takes to detect an infestation. A common lag-time is two to three months before bed bugs are actually discovered. Bed bugs are adept at hiding in narrow spaces, in the seams of mattresses, behind headboards, and in the cracks of other furniture.
The biology of bed bugs also enables them to go undetected. They are most active between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m., and inject an anesthetic into you as they bite, numbing you to the pain. They can drink up to three times their weight in your blood. Further, most people have no noticeable reaction to the bites. In the worst of cases, a victim can be bitten hundreds of times in one night and have to go the hospital because they’ve lost so much blood.
Contrary to popular belief, bed bugs are not caused by poor sanitation or one’s social status, and infestations must be introduced by bringing in an item that has bugs or eggs associated with it. Poor sanitation, particularly clutter, can make it more difficult to control or eliminate a bed bug infestation.
Take special precautions when you travel, especially if your trip includes a hotel stay. One pest control employee said her travel protocol involves immediately placing her zipped suitcase in the bathtub when she arrives in a hotel/motel room, since bed bugs are incapable of crawling across or up slick metal.
She inspects behind the headboard, behind the nightstands, and if possible behind all wooden pieces of furniture – areas where bed bugs like to hide. She also lifts the covers of the bed and checks the seams of the mattress and underneath it, as well as the box spring for signs of bugs or for the black spotting indicating the presence of the bugs’ defecation of blood.
Once the room has passed these steps, the careful traveller places her suitcase on a metal cot, and never unpacks the clothing into the drawers of the hotel’s dresser, as bed bugs can easily hide in the cracks of the furniture. She keeps her suitcase zipped tightly when it’s not in use, and places her shoes on the counters or tables, not on the floor.
People need to also think about bed bugs when bring home furniture, clothing or other household items from secondhand stores, thrift shops and garage sales.
Getting rid of bed bugs isn’t easy. Most of the time, it involves several steps including vacuuming, chemical treatment, steam cleaning, and hot laundering.
Pest control companies use a specially designed vacuum that sucks up bed bugs. The insects die at 50°C for an extended period so a hot wash and hot dry of all infested clothing is required.
Thermal treatment, which includes heat guns, warms up your home and the items in it up to 60 degrees for several hours. And chemical applications with insecticides have to be repeated after several weeks to catch hatching eggs, which can be no larger than a grain of sand.
Bed bugs are not listed as a vector in the UK, and there is no mandatory reporting system for bed bug infestations. A vector is any organism capable of transmitting disease, such as fleas, ticks, mosquitoes and rodents.
They are capable of carrying human pathogens, but they’ve been proven to transmit disease between humans. If bed bugs were deemed a vector, landlord and tenant laws could be rewritten to help landlords treat units effectively and help tenants comply with treatment requirements.
Article provided by Dynamic Pest Control