This Reuters piece was about how passengers on Nigerian motorcycle taxis were putting calabashes and portions of tires on their heads to avoid using the taxi’s passenger helmets, under a new law that requires motorcycle riders to wear helmets.

Newspapers quoted passengers as saying they feared the helmets could be laced with magic spells so as to knock the wearer unconscious and make them easier to rob, while others feared they would pick up an infection.

But the interesting point was this:

One columnist said transportation can already carry a health risk, and recounted how he had picked up a bedbug while sitting on a bus.

“The story is that people who have scabies, craw-craw, ringworm, dandruff and all other such diseases would easily infect others with them through the helmets,” Steve Nwosu wrote in the Daily Sun.

I’m not sure I’d want to share helmets with New York City motorcycle taxi riders either.

But Reuters readers should be aware you can get bed bugs from planes, subways, buses, and trams in Manhattan, Toronto, Prague, and the City of London, just as you can in Capetown or Lagos.

Enjoy!
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• Residents sue motel on Staten Island due to bed bugs

The Manhattan, KS Mercury reports today that

The Econo Lodge on Tuttle Creek Boulevard was closed last week by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, due to several rooms having “bed bugs.” Bob Borot, the hotel’s manager, said he expects it to re-open this Friday.

Borot said 10 to 15 rooms had problems with bed bugs.

What, you’re surprised?  We know Manhattan has a serious bed bug problem!  (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

The motel won’t re-open until the KDHE re-inspects it after treatment and gives the all clear

Bad news: former inhabitants of the rooms were sent to other hotels in the city.  Let’s hope they were instructed about proper precautions to avoid taking bed bugs with them.  (Our Travel FAQs provide good advice on how not to spread bed bugs to other places.)

(No Borat jokes, please.)Similar Posts:

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In a new article in Time Out New York’s Apartment section this week, entitled “Bugs in a rug … and everything else!” TONY teases readers:

Yeah, we know you love found furniture. We do too. But what’s hiding in that street-side score?

Good question.

Journalist Julia Schweizer tours the Lower East Side and Williamsburg, examining curbside freebies with local pest control pros. They find a folding chair, a mattress and box spring set, a desk, a carpet, and a cabinet.

None of the items is absolutely confirmed to have bed bugs, but only one item (the desk) is assumed (rightly or not) to be bed bug-free.

There’s some advice I don’t 100% agree with:

[Timothy Wong from M&M Pest Control] —and most other sane people—advise against taking mattresses off the street, ever. They’re called bedbugs, people. Nonetheless, he says, if the box spring, frame and mattress are out together, you can assume they’re infested (while if the mattress is alone, it’s more likely that it’s just been thrown out for a new one).

Well, this may be true in some cases, but there’s also been a trend the last 5-10 years or so towards using mattresses without box springs. I know this because a Rockaway Bedding employee talked me out of a box spring when I bought a standard depth mattress for a platform bed about 5-6 years ago. Yes, he actually tried not to sell me something (it worked!)

People with platform beds, captains’ beds, or slatted frames often don’t use box springs, and these frames are popular with space-limited city dwellers. Even with more traditional frames, the newer thick mattresses make the “box” less of a necessity.

The absence of a frame, too, is not necessarily proof. Some people seem to think bed bugs are a “mattress” or “mattress and box spring” problem; they might not discard a frame right away. They might not have one. A lot of people also think, wrongly, that metal frames are “safe.” Though it is true there are some frame designs which may be more salvageable or more easily inspected than a mattress or box.

All I am saying is, I don’t think it’s good to assume a mattress on its own is a “safer” find.

The article also has promising advice. Re: the desk, Schweizer says,

Wong had suggested inspecting wood or metal items by spraying the crevices with an application duster, like Falcon Dust-Off JR ($5 at Staples). If there is a pest problem, this will force the little buggers out of hiding.

This is something people can do at home when inspecting the crevices of wooden items with a forced air canister (but be ready to kill what you scare out: have a contact killer or something-to-smash-with handy).

And the article also contains sinister PCO anecdotes, like this one from Montag Hicham (of Abolish Pest Control):

“Sometimes I ask people if they will put a sign up [on discarded furniture after I exterminate their home] and they say, ‘No! I want someone to take it!’ I guess they don’t want their neighbors thinking they’re dirty.”

Yes.

We have a lot to do as far as educating New Yorkers about bed bugs. I am glad TONY is trying to help. I hope city officials will start taking charge on the bed bug issue. Don’t you? Well, then, tell them!

In a related article, “Pickup Tips,” Schweizer talked to managers of a dozen “big-name” secondhand shops all over New York City who

…all admitted to not doing much more than eyeballing an item before reselling it.

Nice.

The only thing that may change such attitudes is a bed bug infestation on the premises — one that is unpleasant, taken home by employees, noticed by customers. And given time, the likelihood is high.

Stores with good reputations ought to care. It makes good business sense, in the secondhand trade, to care if your stock and premises have bed bugs.

Personally, I was already spooked by bed bugs and so do not want to take the chance on secondhand items (sold or foraged) that I do not know for certain to be bed bug free and/or which I can’t seal in a sealed ziploc after acquiring, and stick into a hot dryer (or hot washer and hot dryer).

Ultimately, I am not sure the message of these articles is strong enough. There just isn’t any way to know an item is bed bug free by looking at it. Even if you collect it from the inside of someone’s home, and they do not know they have bed bugs, the item can have bed bugs. I can’t stress that enough.

If you have unfortunately already experienced bed bugs, you are more likely to be in the “spooked” camp. If you haven’t, and don’t know anyone who has had them and shared their story in some detail, you may not be able to really feel this concern.

Like the secondhand shop managers, it might take a full-on bed bug infestation — which costs you thousands and takes months to clear — in order to make you worry about this.

But I hope not.Similar Posts:

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A bed bug notice found in a building lobby in Manhattan, by our stealthy photo contributor, iPhone Interloper.

Good:

• Building management admitting problem publicly, posting notice.
• Notice asking for bed bug reports.
• Notice reminding tenants secondhand mattresses are a no-no.
• Notice is building-wide even though only one unit has apparently identified a bed bug problem.
• Even guests can see the note. This seems like fair warning to them.

Bad:

• Secondhand everything is a no-no, and building management seems unaware.
• Is management having a PCO carefully and regularly inspect every unit? 50% of people bitten by bed bugs do not react (with itching or bite marks) and may have no idea. It is really hard to find bed bugs.
• Tenants with no obvious signs may not know how to look. Having a bed bug dog traipse through every room might be best idea.
• No one should live with bed bugs for one year, as the scrawled note implies. Bed bugs can be treated, but not usually when you take people’s word as to whether they have them or not. They may not know, or may know and not care.
• Bed bugs that cannot be eliminated in one year from one unit implies they are not just in the one unit.
• Bottom line: if you have had bed bugs in your building for a year, I do not think it is true that management is doing everything they can to eliminate the problem and prevent it spreading. I do not mean that tenants are not also responsible; they are, and must fully cooperate with inspections and treatment. But from what I understand, the problem of tenants not disclosing or not cooperating with treatment is something management can deal with through legal channels.

Note: Please understand: I think the existence of this note is very good: very, very good. I just think that management and tenants may not be doing enough. But now I am interested in knowing: how many of you in bed bug infested buildings received a notice in the mail, or have one posted in your building?

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Finally.

The Daily News reports that New York City is going to get a bed bug education campaign.

The article reports that there will be town hall meetings about bed bugs in Washington Heights (1/28), Astoria (2/5) and Bushwick (3/12).

Housing officials will roll out the campaign with a town hall meeting Jan. 28 in Washington Heights, where the creatures have rampaged through tenements, churches, bodegas, taxi garages and upscale co-ops overlooking the Hudson River.

Residents there have been under siege: The number of complaints has skyrocketed from 62 in 2005 to 366 last year, when 119 landlords were hit with violations.

More community forums will follow in two other neighborhoods with recent bedbug outbreaks: Astoria on Feb. 5, and Bushwick, Brooklyn, on March 12.

Tenants, homeowners and community leaders will be taught in English and Spanish how to identify bedbugs, exterminate them in a safe and low-cost manner and guard against future contaminations.

Just as important, they’ll be told what not to do, like spray an apartment, which can scatter the pests, or pour gasoline on mattresses, which poses a fire hazard.

This is all good, but I hope it will be just the start of a wider campaign to raise awareness. Television, billboard, newspaper, and bus shelter advertisements should be implemented to raise awareness, though there has been no suggestion this will happen. If the city wants to fight bed bugs, it is going to cost money, but not nearly as much as continuing to ignore the problem would have cost us in lost tourist income.

Awareness is just the start; as we’ve been saying for a long time, we need local government to track infestations. Someone needs to know where the bed bugs are and how widespread infestations are. Calls to 311 are just the tip of the iceberg. The city is still in denial about the true scope of the problem.

Another goal of the campaign: Alerting immigrants with limited English to watch out for unscrupulous merchants.

“Selling refurnished mattresses to Dominican immigrants who think they’re brand new – without telling them they’ve been reserviced – is a big business in my district,” said City Councilman Miguel Martinez (D-Washington Heights). “Unfortunately, many of those mattresses are crawling with bedbugs.”

This is important. The resale of mattresses should be banned. It should be illegal to pick up and resell any items marked as infested with bed bugs. And people need to learn to mark them as such.
Ultimately, though, the city is going to need to take a tougher line with landlords and tenants. Tenants must report bed bugs, landlords must treat them properly, PCOs must be contracted to come back until bed bugs are gone.

City inspectors should consider employing bed bug dogs to help them detect bed bugs, since visual inspections are time consuming and quick inspections often miss bed bugs.

Finally, financial assistance will be needed on several levels: homeowners and landlords may need assistance with proper treatment. And elderly, disabled, and other people will need physical and financial assistance with doing proper preparation for treatment.

I hope the city will institute a bed bug task force and staff it with entomologists who are true experts on bed bugs–and I hope these experts will be listened to and their suggestions followed. And soon.

This is no hero on a white horse, folks, but it is a start.

Check out the Daily News story here.

Update later in the day on 1/15:

Here’s a video from ABC7 Eyewitness News at 5 pm today.  (Click on the number “2″ next to the bed bug photo, to see the video.)

It is not clear what the city is going to do, besides hold these meetings and work on the mattress resale issue. I guess we will know more tomorrow when the plan is officially unveiled.

The ABC7 video features Jeffery Eisenberg of Pest Away, and a Pest Away tech reporting that they use two chemicals in fighting bed bugs (Suspend and Gentrol).

The newscasters quipped to one another at the end,

“You said you’d get a new bed, right?”

“And you said you’d get a new house!”

Sorry ladies. It’s not that easy.Similar Posts:

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