Results tagged “bedbug”

If bedbugs in the office are the next city scare, sign us up for bubble living. NY1 got an anonymous tip that "workers on eight floors of the Department of Homeless Services building on Beaver Street have been getting bitten by insects since Monday." But the DHS said, "We immediately began taking corrective action, and are extending it to all premises occupied by DHS. We are aggressively addressing the situation with an expert contractor and building management. No DHS employee has reported bites received from our building." Related: David Letterman doesn't understand what why Mary Louise Parker is so freaked out about bedbugs.

Last night, actress Mary Louise Parker was on Late Show with David Letterman, revealing that she's been worrying about that feared scourge, bedbugs. But Letterman didn't seem very convinced they were a real threat, asking, "Is it that treacherous? Is it that dire?... What's the worst that can happen if you have bedbugs?" Oh, Dave, if you only knew!

No one likes bedbugs—except maybe bedbug exterminators who make bank for (hopefully) getting rid of the bedbugs—and it turns out, shocker of all shockers, that potential buyers don't like them either! The NY Times' real estate section has a big article on the effects of bedbugs on deals and opens with an example of an "elegant two-bedroom co-op in an Upper East Side prewar building had drifted on the market for nine months by the time the first-time buyers laid eyes on it this spring." The buyers loved it, especially when they could get it for $50,000 less at $625,000. But then, in their "due diligence" phase, their lawyer said, "The [co-op board] minutes referenced multiple attempts to exterminate bedbugs in the building." Oh, crap.

With news that bed bug complaints soared in 2008 and the City Council poised to vote on bed bug legislation this Tuesday, the NY Times spoke to entomologist Louis Sorkin, who works at the American Museum of Natural History. His descriptions are fascinating, if creepy: "Around 1989, someone brought in our first bed bug. Most entomologists had never seen a live infestation before. Now, infestations may be approaching the levels of 50 years ago, before DDT was used." Referring to how the bloodsuckers are becoming more immune to toxins: "That’s why pest control companies do all sorts of things besides using chemicals: heating, freezing, steaming, vacuuming. The hardest part of controlling bed bugs is finding them. Most of the literature out there talks about a quarter-inch-long reddish-brown insect, but a bed bug is a millimeter long when it’s born, about the thickness of a credit card." Sorkin added, "A pest-control company once brought in slippers from an infested apartment. You could see all the eggs that had been plastered onto the soles and all the bugs that were hiding." Blergh.

Reader JesqNY took this photograph of a discarded chair in Washington Heights. The chair's former owner helpfully notes that this chair apparently has bed bugs--"chinche" in Spanish--but we think it would have been better to wrap the chair in a sealed plastic bag, which is what one should do if they are getting rid of bed bug infested furniture (actually, people should consult with a licensed professional exterminator, but here's a PDF from the Health Department).

With the buzz about the 248 McKibbin Street MySpace page organizing comments about its bedbug infestation, we thought it would be a good time to visit the Bedbug City Map. The map relies on reported bedbug incidents, which are mapped by the intensity of the infestation as well - and 248 McKibbin is at the red "Help!" level.

Chelsea, by Joe Holmes.

- "People searching for bedbugs do not know to look along the seams of mattresses, under box springs, behind headboards and picture frames, and even inside alarm clocks and telephones"There are many more, but we were intrigued by the case of Peter Young, whose Ludlow Street apartment was infested. Young slept on an inflatable bed and then a metal cot while the landlord tried to get rid of the bugs to no avail. So Young did what any self-respecting, sick-of-bedbugs tenants would do: He stopped paying rent. A judge ruled in Young's favor, saying, "In this case, the bedbugs did not constitute mere annoyance, but constituted an intolerable condition, notwithstanding the landlord’s efforts to exterminate them," and Young got a rent abatement. Young, who now lives in Brooklyn, told the Times and sleeps on a futon, “Psychologically, I’m afraid of beds. I feel traumatized.”

Two awesomely odd but true stories:

Bedbugs are horrible and gross and nothing that anyone should have to deal with. That said, it's probably not a great idea to douse your mattress with gasoline in order to repel the critters. The FDNY has found a number of Queens residents who have taken to soaking their mattresses with gasoline - even children's mattresses - as a foolproof way of getting rid of bedbugs. Or even wiping it on themselves. Battalion Chief Robert Turner tells the Post, "Gasoline is very explosive - even static electricity from a rug can ignite it." Point taken, but we understand the desperation to get rid of the bugs.

It's midterms week and you've broken out into a rash. But it's not because you're worried about your GPA - you've got bedbugs! Some poor freshmen at Columbia University are being evacuated from their rooms in John Jay Hall in order for housing services to fumigate the rooms. And not only do they have to evcuate, they need to "completely empty their rooms." The Columbia Spectator notes the craziness of the fumigation scheme, given that it is in the middle of exams, with one victim asking, "Couldn’t they fumigate over spring break, when, even if people are staying at Columbia, they won’t have academic schedules to be disrupted?” Not at Columbia - they are serious about bedbugs, for fear they might travel to other parts of John Jay and perhaps require housing services to buy new mattresses for the entire dorm! Okay, we're just guessing that, but now that we think about the mattress situation that we all go through during college-housing days, it's disgusting. Perhaps getting a vinyl zippered 16" deep mattress cover (just $12.99) from Bed Bath and Beyond would be helpful.

Bedbug paranoia is reaching a fever pitch in the city, with news outlets finding a variety of ways to cover the gross little pests to make us feel itchy. Now City Council member Gail Brewer will reintroduce a bill that will ban the sale of "reconditioned" mattresses and make sure new mattresses aren't tainted by old ones as well. Brewer has been brewing (we couldn't help it) this since last May, but the sound and fury of New Yorker's cries - and stats like 2 bedbug complaints in 2002, 16 in 2003 to 449 complaints during a five month period last year - are making the bedbug enemy number one - perhaps even after the nasty roach. Brewer wants to create a "bedbud task force" and Gothamist wonders if there is a Rat Academy, shoudln't there be Insect Prep?

On the heels of this past weekend's stomach turning report that, yes, bedbugs are on the rise all over the city, two Swiss businesswomen are suing the Hotel Pennsylvania and Vornado Realty Trust over the bedbug-infested stay they had in September. Their lawyer says that when the women complained to a hotel employee about being bitten by something, the employee immediately said, "Bedbugs!" showing that there was knowledge of the pest at the Penn Station-area hotel. The women were treated at a local hospital and also have "gruesome" photographs to show their wounds on their face, necks, torsos, arms and legs. Since travelers tend to carry bedbugs, this is yet another story in a long line of "the hotel's bedbugs bit me" - we remember a case at the Helmsley Hotel in 2003. Gothamist wonders if we should travel with disposable plastic sheets to sleep in the next time we stay in a hotel.

Oh if only we could go back to the days when "don't let the bedbugs bite" was just something you said. But, as the Times really tries to hammer home today, that just doesn't seem to be possible anymore.

Ask Gothamist tackled bedbugs a few days ago. And check out the Health Department's information and suggestions on how to handle bed bugs. Some Mexican businessmen had claimed that there are bedbugs at one of the Helmsley hotels, but they settled for $150,000.

AT, East Village

The only evidence of bedbugs are the "telltale red, itchy welts on your skin in the morning." Ewww. The city's Health Department doesn't think it's a major issue (yet) since the bed bugs don't transit diseases, but local politicians think the Health Department should be doing more. In its tips for what people can do to avoid bedbugs, the Daily News suggests that people be careful when buying used furniture or mattresses and notes that exterminators should cost between $250-475 (and that they should not "bomb" an apartment), plus points the way to the Pesticide Management Education program at Cornell. And the Department of Health does have information and suggestions on how to handle bed bugs.

emotional distress and lost earnings." Helmsley lawyers are saying that the lawsuit is a publicity stunt, considering they have only heard about it through the media. But what a publicity stunt it is: The Queen of Mean and bedbugs!