Student Aaryn Secker finally moved out after battling bed bugs in Solin Hall for months:

Secker notified Howard Zinman, Services Coordinator for Solin Hall, after discovering tiny red bites all over her body in September. Residence Services was initially responsive to her concerns, replacing her mattress and couch, paying for dry cleaning, and spraying her room with chemicals to kill the bugs.

But despite the intensive cleaning, Secker said that the bedbugs returned.

“They kept coming back. McGill [Residence Services] replaced my bed about twice. By the end of it they ended up taking out my bed and my fridge,” she said.

When the problem persisted, Secker moved out for good and sought rent compensation from the Student Housing Office for the entire academic year.

McGill’s refusal to reimburse Secker for rent or to terminate her lease has caused Secker to threaten bringing her case to the Régie du Logement, Quebec’s housing office.

Zinman refused to comment on Secker’s case, citing confidentiality reasons. He said the process of treating bedbug infestations has not changed since last year’s incidents in MORE Houses and New Residence, where bedbugs were found in several rooms.

It is not easy to treat for bed bugs, let alone in student housing. But replacing a bed twice does not seem like the most well-considered protocol, since beds can be treated, and moving infested furniture is tricky.

Perhaps McGill and their pest control operator should talk to Stanford and their pest control operator (who we believe is Crane Pest, San Francisco). Stanford has had its share of bed bugs, but the reports of their responses so far have been the best we have heard of on college campuses. And let’s face it, there will be bed bugs on college campuses, you can’t stop that from happening, though you can try to implement policies to help prevent it. And you can educate students and staff about the problem.

What matters most, though, is the response when bed bugs are discovered.

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Pillow Fight New York City 2008

Photo uploaded to flickr.com by urbanblitz

In the age of bed bugs, it does not seem that wise for people around the world, in cities like Vancover and New York (pictured here) to have large group pillow fights.

Dave, a participant, is one who realized this after the fact. He writes,

For the last couple years New York City has been gripped in a panic over bedbugs. I mean you would think it’s the second coming of the 1932 Cholera epidemic the way people talk about them. Yet here were hundreds if not a thousand people wildly intermingling old dirty pillows, ripping them apart and then traipsing through their innards. You’d think this would be the bedbug equivalent of a 1000 person orgy without a single prophylactic. No one seemed concerned, but mark my words if the bedbug thing explodes in the next few months you can be damn sure it’ll be traced back to this.

We don’t need to wait. You can be sure that a pillow fight in Union Square would surely have included people who had bed bugs in their pillows and not a clue.

Numbers won’t spike significantly due to this, since they’re already very high. But people will be bringing bed bugs to these parties. Some will doubtless bring them home– after all that fun, I am sure taking steps to avoid bed bugs is the last thing on their minds.

This guy may have had some idea:

All Suited Up

Originally uploaded by urbanblitz

I am sure anyone who’d consider participating in this would just think I was being paranoid or curmudgeonly, but I really don’t think this event is a good idea.

Nevertheless, it goes on: according to the World Pillow Fight Day website, the 2008 pillow fights in Toronto and Montreal are set to be held when the weather is warmer. San Francisco had theirs on Valentine’s Day: way to spread the bed bug love.

IMG_1645

Originally uploaded by wheredaveis

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Out of Montréal, in fact: La Cibole de Cimex. The author is named Corinne and has had bed bugs. Deux fois. Merde!

(I only get to swear in French, because Bed Bug Helloise is a proud monoglot. She hasn’t a clue I have a multilingual potty mouth.)

Two times. We’re sorry to hear that, but we are glad she’s blogging about it and can provide a bed bug resource pour les francophones.

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Already forced to sleep on the floor, couches, and even pool tables, the residents have also discovered their new pets surfacing in their clothes and notebooks while in class.

If you have bed bugs coming out of your notebooks and clothes while out of the home, you have a serious problem. It is unclear what the students and college are doing besides having exterminators spray. and I wonder if they know about washing and drying clothes on hot, and keeping them sealed in bags, sealed mattresses and box springs in sealed bedbug-proof cases, and so on.

Monique Mercier, Administrative Coordinator of Student Housing, said she has received many calls from worried parents, but that she has provided students with preventative spray bottles.

She contended that controlling the bed bugs is now the responsibility of the first-year residents.

‘I can’t believe they’re still alive,’ she said. ‘The situation is impossible to control. We’ve been doing everything we can, but we’re not experts; we’re following the advice of professionals.’

She added that McGill and Montreal are unequipped to manage such a situation.

“Controlling the bed bugs is now the responsibility of the first year students.” Great policy. But I do understand her frustration. McGill University and the City of Montreal need a plan to deal with bed bugs. And parents should be worried, as should we all. Those students are going to each go to a different family home come the winter break. and the problem will spread. It’s already spreading to other students (if they’re seeing bugs in the classrooms).

My heart goes out to these first year students, who have other things they should be worrying about and working on instead of a blood-sucking parasite. McGill is a private university and should be worried about losing fee-paying students, who may drop out if they are stressed out and not getting enough sleep.

A second article in the York University Excalibur paper added additional details:

During the final fumigation two weeks ago, residents had to vacate their house for eight hours. McGill Residences provided them with accommodations at Royal Victoria College for the duration of the evacuation.

Hmm, I hope the folks at Royal Victoria College monitor those rooms, since it would be really easy for the bugs to have been moved there.

And I know I sound like a broken record here, but: did they really fumigate (ie tent the building and gas it with Vikane, which works but is costly and a big production)? Or did they use bug bombs (which don’t work for bed bugs, period)? Or did they do some other kind of spraying which the author is erroneously calling “fumigation”?

I should stop typing those last three questions, and simply add them to this blog’s template. ‘Cause, dude, it’s like I have to ask that every day!*

*Sorry for the lapse into surfer talk, but reading about colleges reminds Nobugsonme of being a student. She was young, foolish, and had lots of studying to do. Thank goodness she did not have bed bugs then.

• Bed bugs at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec
• Stanford U bed bugs: being fought with enthusiasm and wisdom
• Bed bugs under discussion at university housing officers’ conference
• bed bugs at University of Bridgeport

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