I just received this e-mail from a friend. Found this on Snopes, though........ http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/household/bedbugs.asp
You also have to watch out for them travelling. Never put your suitcase on the bed until you check it first. Otherwise you might bring some new friends home with you. It's ok though. All bedbugs are Blazer fans.
No, never put the suitcase on the bed. You only put it on the metal suitcase rack since the bed bugs can't climb the slick metal. Also everyone knows that pests like bed bugs are Laker fans. Seriously, someone gave you so bad info on this subject.
It's not just from these countries. It also comes from the curbing of DDT use. Philly, NJ, and NY are inundated with the things. I know a guy that actually chose to not extend his lease on his apartment because he just got bed bugs.
Serious question: Does anyone know what's being done right now (or being planned) about the bed bugs situation?
Exterminators are making a mint. There aren't any pesticides that work all that well vs. them and they are notoriously difficult to locate and remove completely. I've read that just in apartments and homes the exterminators coming back two, three times is not uncommon.
A characteristic of urban legends generally is lack of detail. First, someone always heard thirdhand. Second, it's always anonymous. They don't say Professor Jane Smith, Associate Professor of Entomology at the Biology Department of University of Oregon. It's "one of the sons" of "some friends" in an unnamed "community".
This guy in the same program at my university was renting a house with some other students. One of his housemates brought home a mattress she found on the side of the road. A few nights later he woke up, turned on the light and the bed bugs scurried away like roaches. Everyone had to move out and the house was fumigated. He got rid of his bed, sheets and pillows and washed all his clothes. The girl insisted the mattress wasn't the source of the infestation...
Bed bugs wouldn't scurry away like that. I work at a University in Philly and we haven't had them yet. Yet being the key word. We recently had a demonstration with a beagle that sniffs them out, which was pretty cool to see. There's a lot of misinformation out there about bed bugs that's leading to a lot of the fear. They're a nuisance, but they're actually harmless from a health hazard perspective. The worst thing about them is that they're incredibly difficult to get rid of. They can go about a year without eating and live, so even if you spray insecticide around, they can find another place to live and then come back later. For the most part though, they don't leave an area and travel around to create an infestation. They're attracted to carbon dioxide and heat, as well as blood. So they hang around where people are (beds, chairs, couches, etc) and won't go to another room unless they're carried because there is no need for them to venture beyond the space they're in.
I caught lice from a hotel when I was around 11 or so. Imagine how itchy a mosquito bite is and x's that by 10.
