My report about the Hillrise Apartments in Cincinnati the other day highlighted what can happen when local officials stop inspecting rental units based on bed bug complaints.

As you’ll recall, funding was cut at the end of 2008 for the Cincinnati Health Department’s bed bug inspection program.

Here’s another story with bedbugged tenants, this time in Columbus, Ohio, where the Franklin County Board of Health is able to inspect homes based on tenant complaints.

NBC4i reports that some residents of The Pointe Apartments on Harrisburg Pike, fed up with bed bug bites,  have evacuated their homes for hotel rooms:

[Tenant Chris White] called officials after an exterminator hired by the property managers didn’t show up May 6.

The property manager wasn’t immediately available for comment.

Neighbors are helping each other look for bed bugs in their cushions and mattresses.

“It’s not my responsibility to do this. It’s the apartment complex. I’m helping friends out,“ he said.

Residents received a letter from the complex officials saying that exterminators would arrive on May 6, but residents said the exterminator never showed up.

Franklin County health officials went door-to-door inspecting apartments.

For the second time since last fall, health officials are issuing orders for pest control as soon as possible.

[Emphasis added.]

Obviously, if there are inspectors who can come in and issue pest control orders, this does not mean bed bugs will necessarily be eradicated quickly and fully.

However, tenants who can call upon such services stand a much better chance than those who can’t. And of course, they are able to call again, if the problem persists, as it did in this case, and the inspectors can become involved again.

Note: the Franklin County Board of Health (this is their bed bugs page) is part of the Central Ohio Bed Bug Task Force, a group that stepped up, according to this article in the Columbus Dispatch last September, when local officials started to become aware of the problem and its effects in Cincinnati.Similar Posts:

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Renee Corea of New York vs. Bed Bugs has another new interview — this time with Central Ohio Bed Bug Task Force (COBBTF) Chair Paul Wenning of the Franklin County Board of Health

New York vs Bed Bugs: We are very impressed with the task force and understand it’s a volunteer organization?

Paul Wenning: We’ve known it was just a matter of time before bed bugs became a large problem in Greater Columbus. I had a series of conversations with officials from Cincinnati and Hamilton County (Greater Cincinnati) in the early autumn of 2008, and the astronomical rise in the number of cases there over a five year period convinced me that we had to take action and quickly. I began conversations with Dr. Susan Jones, from the Ohio State University Extension Office, who is also a leading expert on bed bugs. We quickly created a Bed Bug Summit, to which representatives of the City of Columbus, the suburbs, and County agencies were invited. It was well attended, and at the end of the program, I asked for volunteers to help establish a Bed Bug Task Force for Columbus and Franklin County. We held our first meeting in November, and I set forth a series of goals and objectives for the group to discuss.

I know you’ll want to read the rest:

The Central Ohio Bed Bug Task Force: an interview with Paul Wenning — New York vs Bed Bugs.Similar Posts:

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A Columbus hospital has recently had bed bugs in two patient units, according to the Columbus Dispatch.  Misti Crane writes:

Bedbugs found in two patient units at Nationwide Children’s Hospital prompted aggressive cleaning and the relocation of patients, according to a statement issued by the hospital.

It said the problem, which has been eliminated, was not due to poor sanitation, nor was it a health threat.

The hospital has hired a pest-control expert and is using a specially trained dog that can detect the presence of bedbugs. The hospital has many units of varying sizes, but officials would not say which units or how many rooms were affected.

“We will continue to take whatever measures are necessary to address this issue, which has unfortunately become chronic in central Ohio,” the statement says.

It’s not the first hospital to become infested with bed bugs, and it won’t be the last.

Bed bugs are hitchhikers: they come into hospitals with people, and other people may then leave the hospital with bed bugs too.

It’s important for hospitals to have a plan for this eventuality, so they can immediately take the necessary steps to get rid of the problem.

via The Columbus Dispatch : Hospital takes action against bedbugs.Similar Posts:

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• Boston University dorm residents bitten by bed bugs
• Milwaukee Housing Authority purchases bed bug sniffing dog

A news story from WBNS in Columbus demonstrates why that city needs better bed bug policies.

First, consider how bed bugs spread amongst neighbors at Bollinger Towers, 750 N. High Street:

Charlotte Hyajneh-Simpson thought she was lucky when her neighbor gave her his new carpet sweeper to keep.

“I started using the sweeper and then I started feeling these bites on me,” Hyajneh-Simpson said.

She told her neighbor, John Rand, about the bites, who said that his neighbor just had his apartment exterminated for bed bugs.

“They went next door and said, ‘Oh my God,’ and they ran out of there because there were so many (bed bugs) in there,” Rand said.  “It was terrible.  When the guy moved his furniture around, you could just pick it up with your hands.”

Hyajneh-Simpson said she was bitten on her arm and leg.

Neighbors sometimes share their homes, their possessions, as well as walls.  Bed bugs can spread in any of those ways.

The Columbus Metropolitan Housing Authority could help reduce this “sharing” of bed bugs.  But its current policies prevent this:

[Hyajneh-Simpson] said that she was upset the Columbus Metropolitan Housing Authority never told her there was a problem, but CMHA said that it only notifies the tenants who are affected to protect their privacy.

Meanwhile, bed bugs spread.

Maybe building managers (whether they are single-building landlords, or a city housing authority) could warn other tenants about the presence of bed bugs in the building, and in attached units, without necessarily declaring which units are affected.

Or maybe we could all get past the idea that having bed bugs is shameful.  The only shame, in my mind, is not telling others that they are being exposed, and not treating infestations thoroughly and promptly.

Another article claimed Columbus apartment building owners are spending $1.5 million a year on bed bugs.

This story demonstrates how better bed bug policies could help reduce the costs of bed bugs to landlords and tenants.  The bottom line is bed bugs spread in buildings.  Neighbors need to know about the risks.  What would happen if schools did not notify parents that a child in class had head lice?   Just as parents need to be notified about head lice, neighbors need to be notified about bed bugs, a much more troublesome and costly problem, to landlords and tenants alike.Similar Posts:

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Why?

Because she’s one of those entomologists who’s telling it like it is, to public officials who want to ignore the bed bug problem. The Columbus Dispatch quoted Jones Tuesday as saying,

“If you bury your head in the sand, you’re going to get bitten, and it’s just going to get worse and worse,” said Susan Jones, an entomology professor at Ohio State University.

And because she’s trying to convince public health officials that bed bugs are a health problem, something many health officials don’t seem to get:

“The question is: Is it a public-health issue or not?” Columbus Health Department spokesman Jose Rodriguez said. “Bedbugs are really looked upon as a nuisance issue.”

OSU’s Jones, however, said scabbing, secondary infections and the anxiety caused by fearing your own bed are serious health concerns.

Amen. It’s not just about the bed bug bites, for crying out loud.

Those alone are often more than a nuisance, but the loss of sleep, anxiety, and loss of money due to treatment or preparations for treatment (which can mean people do not get the food, health care, or other resources they need) can have even more serious health consequences for many.

Susan Jones is involved with the Cincinnati/Hamilton County Joint Bed Bug Task Force.

Code enforcement handles individual complaints, but Jones recommends a centralized master plan.

She suggested a task force that combines the expertise of pest-control, health, code-enforcement and housing agencies. Trends would be easier to spot with all the complaints and treatment numbers in one place, and a task force also could coordinate a publicity campaign to tell people how to stop the spread of bedbugs.

People should seal infested furniture in plastic before disposing of it; travelers ought to check hotel beds for pests; and exterminators need to know that bedbugs are harder to kill than most insects, experts said.

Jones works with a similar task force in Hamilton County. The group was launched after the Cincinnati Health Department received 737 bedbug complaints in 2007 – the same number as for mice, rats and roaches combined.

I wonder how New York City’s bed bug complaints stack up against our complaints for mice /rats / roaches?

The article’s basic focus is on how Columbus / Franklin County, Ohio need to step up their own response to bed bugs.

Well, you know what they say: admitting your city or county has a bed bug problem is the first step towards solving it.
Similar Posts:

• British NHS hospitals have frequent pest infestations, including bed bugs
• bad news: APictureofMe’s Caryn’s got bed bugs, again
• Bed bugs as big business: 1939 Post Office London Directory

• TheStar.com | Battling bedbugs is not easy: Joe Fiorito talks to Steve Floros of Toronto Community Housing:
  This is a public housing official: “We have a program of unit refurbishment. We’re spending $75 million over three years to upgrade kitchens and bathrooms; we want to seal every crack so there isn’t free ability of the pests to move. And our new buildings have similar specs…” Seems pretty progressive to me.
  (tags: torontocommunityhousing toronto publichousing affordablehousing low-incomehousing tenants bedbugs ontario canada thestar spread caulking sealants prevention JoeFiorito treatment)
• GoErie.com: Don’t let the bedbugs bite
  “Many infestations can be traced to people coming to the United States from third-world countries or Eastern Europe.” (I’m not sure anyone has actually traced the paths of these infestations. Yes, bed bugs travel, but they do so in every direction. I don’t doubt that bed bugs do come with immigrants, but they also go out with travelers and business people. They know no boundaries of class, national origin, or nationality, and whenever people throw down the “immigrant” card, I get my hackles up.)
  (tags: misinformation immigration immigrantsandbedbugs pennsylvania erie bedbugs spread travel)
• The Columbus Dispatch : Fighting the biters
  On recent bed bug pyrethroid resistance studies: “The Cincinnati and Lexington bugs were immune at levels 200 to 300 times the recommended dosage and also unaffected when directly sprayed with two commercial pyrethroid insecticides.” Lots more of interest here on the relative immunity to pyrethroids of bed bugs in various cities.
  (tags: bedbug pyrethroids treatment nov2007 2007 cincinnati lexington columbus spread bedbugs epidemic)

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