New York Bed Bug Information
According to CNN
New York (CNN) — New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn has a message for bed bugs: “Drop dead!”
And the city said Wednesday it’s backing that message up with some big bucks.
Quinn, along with Deputy Mayor Linda Gibbs, announced a $500,000 initiative of city funding to help deal with one of the city’s most annoying and difficult-to-eradicate pests.
The city will launch an educational campaign on how to better combat these critters, including better coordinated efforts by city agencies, a new health department task force and a bed bug web portal.
“The portal will provide factual and targeted information for New Yorkers affected by bed bugs in their homes,” Quinn explained at a press conference on the steps of City Hall. The site will tell New Yorkers “how to prevent and treat an infestation. And what to look for in an exterminator and how to safely dispose of infected items.”
The resources were allocated based on the recommendations of the New York City Bed Bug Advisory Board, a group of industry experts, entomologists, advocates and representative from city agencies.
Bed bug infestations have been on the rise in the city, affecting apartments, retail stores, schools and hospitals. Telephone complaints to New York City 311 hotline jumped from 21,922 in 2008 to 33,772 complaints in 2009.
Earlier this month bed bug infestations shut down two stores in downtown Manhattan for two days.
New York’s increase in bed bugs is due in part to its population density and its bustling tourism. Quinn joked with reporters, “Everyone wants to come to New York, even the bed bugs. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere — even as a bug.”
Quinn acknowledged that the numbers on infestations may get worse before they getter better. “Once there is information out there and publicity about the portal, the number may go up.”
Quinn reassured New Yorkers that the city will continue to monitor 311 calls and city agencies, and if more needs to be done the city will take other steps.
The rise in bed bug cases is not exclusive to New York. Last year, the federal Environmental Protection Agency sponsored a bed bug conference in Arlington, Virginia. Speaking to a crowd of 230 academics, agency employees and exterminators, Dale Kemery, an agency spokesman, said the incidence of infestation in the United States has tripled since 2005.
Despite their name, bed bugs need not live in beds. They generally live within 10 to 20 feet of their hosts and avoid light, preferring the dark security of spaces behind headboards, under baseboards and behind hanging pictures. They are parasites that feed on human blood, and their bites can leave red, itchy welts.
According to the AP and Yahoo News.
NEW YORK – One of every 15 New Yorkers battled bedbugs last year, officials said Wednesday as they announced a plan to fight the spreading infestation, including a public-awareness campaign and a top entomologist to head the effort.
The bloodsucking pests, which are not known to spread disease but can cause great mental anguish with their persistent and fast-growing infestations, have rapidly multiplied throughout New York and many other U.S. cities in recent years.
Health officials and pest control specialists nationwide report surges in sightings, bites and complaints. The Environmental Protection Agency hosted its first-ever bedbug summit last year.
In New York City, the pests have been discovered in theaters, clothing stores, office buildings, housing projects and posh apartments.
The stigma of having bedbugs — whose bites leave itchy red welts — and the elusive nature of the pests make it impossible to fully understand the problem, experts say.
But in 2009, for the first time, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s administration included a question about bedbugs on its community health survey, and it revealed the finding to The Associated Press on Wednesday: More than 6 percent of New Yorkers who responded said they had battled the pests in the last year.
The figure would equal roughly 400,000 adults in the city, the health department said.
Data previously has been limited to government statistics on complaints and surveys of private pest-control companies, which have also reported nationwide spikes.
The Bloomberg administration fielded 537 complaints about the bugs in fiscal 2004. In fiscal 2009, there were nearly 11,000.
“This is happening globally, and I don’t think anybody has figured out exactly why,” said Daniel Kass, the city’s deputy commissioner for environmental health. “So what we’re left with is managing them and keeping them from spreading. They’re going to be with us for some time.”
Bedbugs are about the size of an apple seed and burrow into many more places than beds. They can slip into floor cracks, wall outlets, picture frames, lamps — any tiny space.
People who have bedbugs often never see them. The most obvious signs are bites, blood on bedsheets and their waste, which looks like black pepper. They are known for being extremely difficult to eradicate, and can go a year without feeding.
Bedbugs were nearly dormant for decades, and the recent comeback has experts scratching their heads. Some attribute the resurgence to an increase in global travel and the prohibition of potent pesticides like DDT.
New York convened a government advisory board last year to study the problem and make recommendations.
The report said one major roadblock to stopping the bedbug spread is lack of knowledge about prevention and the patchy and sometimes erroneous information about treatment.
“If you have termites, you know how to deal with it. If you see a rat, you know who to call. This is confusing,” said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn. “The biggest issue is lack of clarity and not having any actual sense of what the next step is and where you go to get that.”
Carol Gittens said she discovered bedbugs in her Brooklyn apartment two years ago, and estimates she has spent at least $3,000 replacing her things.
“We had to throw everything out — mattresses, clothes,” she said.
The apartment was thoroughly cleaned and she thought she had eliminated them. But a neighbor recently reported she has bedbugs, and Gittens said she might have them in her apartment again.
The high cost of throwing out infested belongings and hiring exterminators contributes to bedbugs’ spread, officials said. Many people, particularly those with low incomes or in public housing, cannot afford to do what it takes.
Acting on the report’s recommendations, New York City said Wednesday it was re-appropriating $500,000 of health department money to begin the first phase of a bedbug battle plan, which is mostly concentrated on information, outreach and the creation of an entomologist-led bedbug team.
Some of the money will go toward creating an online bedbug portal where New Yorkers can find information about avoiding the pests as well as how to treat their homes. The city already has a rat-information portal.
Many people are unaware they have the bugs, officials said, and end up spreading them by carrying them on their clothing or discarding personal items that have the bugs.
Travelers also need to be more vigilant, the city says.
“Everyone has got to get used to the idea that they have got to check for them periodically,” Kass said. “People who travel should look at the rooms they’re staying in. They should check their clothing. There are good preventive measures.”
Experts recommend looking for bugs with a bright flashlight, and using a hot hair dryer to flush them out of hiding places and cracks.
Bedding, linens, curtains, rugs and clothes from infested homes must be washed in hot water. Mattresses, furniture and floors must be vacuumed, and vacuum bags should be immediately disposed in sealed plastic bags. Hiring a certified exterminator to apply pesticides is also recommended.
Officials also said the city would adopt the report’s recommendation of working to establish protocol for disposing of infested furniture and other personal items.
The report also suggested more work should be done by agencies that serve lower-income New Yorkers, and public housing infestations should be addressed more quickly. But at a time when the city is cutting services and shrinking its job force to save money, those goals are likely not immediately achievable.
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