A train conductor says she was bitten by a bedbug on the N train yesterday, as if we weren't already aware that these tiny monsters had fully migrated from our movie theaters to the bowels of the city, waiting for just the right moment to unseat city leadership and turn the five boroughs into human bloodletting factories.
According to the MTA, the unidentified conductor reported the bite Monday afternoon, while onboard a Coney Island-bound N train at Dekalb Ave. The conductor reportedly requested medical attention—confusing, since a dose of calamine lotion is typically the only medical attention a bedbug requires—and the train was taken out of service for inspection.
This has been a month full of subway bedbug sightings, and on the N alone there have been reports since the first week of August. An N train cleaner also recently discovered a significant bedbug infestation in her own home. Alleged sightings on other trains have sparked MTA investigations.
According to the Daily News, there were also bedbug sightings on the N, Q and 6 trains this weekend, although those are unconfirmed. Not that there's much to be done in terms of prevention, unless the rest of us wrap ourselves in plastic on the platform: "As with every alleged bedbug sighting, we have taken the affected train out of service for extermination," MTA spokesperson Adam Lisberg told us in a statement. "The MTA carries more than 5.5 million subway riders a day, but we don't check them for bedbugs before letting them on a train." Note that every time a train is taken out of service, the rest of the line experiences a delay. If bedbug anxiety wasn't causing your blood pressure to spike before, just wait until you're forced off a train in the middle of rush hour to make room for the bug-sniffing canines.
