OK, how about "big black bedbugs"?
July 26, 2001
Bedbugs Checking in at the Best Hotels
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
AINESVILLE, Fla., July 25 (AP) — A University of Florida
researcher says luxury hotels in the United States are increasingly
playing host to unwelcome guests: bedbugs.
Phil Koehler, an urban entomologist with the university's Institute of Food
and Agricultural Sciences, said Tuesday that the blood-feeding insect is being
found more frequently in cities that have had an influx of tourists from
abroad.
Infestations have been reported in hotels and motels and, Mr. Koehler
noted, not just seedy ones. "Bedbugs are associated in the public's mind with
filthy living conditions, but that's not the case," he said. "They can be brought
into any environment and are very good at hiding, so even upscale hotels can
have infestations." Pest-control companies have reported a tenfold increase
in bedbug service calls in Florida since 1999.
Pest-control specialists say increased tourism has contributed to the problem
because bedbugs are carried in luggage from overseas.
The United States had 51 million tourists from abroad in 2000, a record
number, up from 48 million in 1999 and 43 million in 1995, according to
Commerce Department figures. Nearly 20 percent of those visitors last year
came to Florida.
Another explanation for the resurgence of bedbugs is that exterminators no
longer indiscriminately spray poisonous chemicals, pest-control experts said.
"When you suppress insects like cockroaches in a targeted manner with
insect baits, it allows for other parts of the insect ecosystem to rise up," said
Mel Whitson, the technical manager for Steritech Group, an environmental
safety company based in Charlotte, N.C.
Adult bedbugs are about the size of a small ladybug and are flat, oval and
wingless. They are brown unless engorged with a meal, when they turn a
mahogany red. Adults feed regularly but can live six months without eating.
Harold Harlan, an entomologist with the National Pest Management
Association, an industry group in Dunn Loring, Va., said that although
bedbugs can harbor about 20 human pathogens, they do not transmit
diseases. |
