Bed Bug Invasion

“Bedbugs invade America!” shouted the headline of a supermarket tabloid. “Small, mean and everywhere,” shouted the Washington Post. “Bloodthirsty bugs are back,” thundered the National Geographic News.

Read the headlines and you’ll get the impression that bedbugs have invaded our shores in force and are biting their way down Main Street in the U.S. Until five years ago, reports of bedbugs were virtually nonexistent in the U.S. Then bloodsucking insects began appearing in homes, apartments, hotels and college dorms across the country, fueling a media frenzy.

Punishing his fellow journalists, David Segal of the Washington Post noted in a February article, “more than 400 articles have been published, all with the same argument: The blood-sucking creatures are back, and in numbers that amount to a scourge. Segal claims that “the scale of this ‘swarm’ has been exaggerated, perhaps wildly so. … The Bugs Are Back’ is a fashion story so perfect that it seems to have been hand-crafted by the gods of fashion. That’s what happens when you combine a creepy villain, primitive fear and soft statistics.

In the March issue of Pest Management Professional, editorial director Frank Andorka made this rebuttal to Segal’s story: “Of course, many reporters are in favor of the bedbug: It’s a great copy – an enigmatic blood-sucking insect that feeds on people when they’re asleep and is difficult to control. What could be a better story than that? But just because it’s good copy doesn’t mean the stories aren’t true.

So what is the real story? Are the bedbugs a genuine threat or is it so much media hype? Some argue that journalists feed the frenzied paranoia of a panicked citizenry. Others point to very real statistics that show a 70% increase in bedbug infestations in the U.S. in the last five years. In a national survey conducted by University of Kentucky entomologist Michael Potter, he found that “a whopping 91% of respondents reported that their organizations had encountered bed bug infestations in the past two years.

Only 37% said they had found bed bugs more than five years ago. Pest control companies that had not received calls about bed bugs for decades suddenly received dozens. In large urban areas, it’s not uncommon for companies to file 100 to 150 bedbug complaints a week, according to a survey by the National Pest Control Association.

Following the near eradication of DDT-based pesticides in the 1950s, bedbugs (Cimex lectularius) are on the rise. A worldwide scourge throughout human history, bedbugs, fleas and lice used to be common bedfellows at night. Your grandmother’s bedtime mantra — “Sleep tight; don’t let the bedbugs bite. – had its roots in the reality of life before World War II when bedbugs were commonly found in beds throughout the United States. In the 1930s, people papered their bedrooms with arsenic wallpaper to kill bedbugs. Metal bed frames, which were considered less likely to harbor bed bugs, were in vogue.

Twice a year, the bedsteads were completely disassembled and scrubbed to keep the bedbugs at bay. Until the insecticidal properties of DDT were discovered during World War II, there was no effective pesticide to eradicate bed bugs. The development of DDT-based insecticides after the war allowed America and most industrialized countries to eradicate bed bugs.

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