“Avoiding bedbugs on trips” |
| Posted: 23 Jan 2011 12:13 AM PST Avoiding bedbugs on trips Q: We are planning a trip to New York City next summer. Is there a list of bedbug-free hotels? How can we protect ourselves? — S.P., Camarillo, Calif. A: Bedbugs have become such an issue that several websites have sprung up to help travelers scope out hotels at their destination. Check out www.bedbugregistry.com and www.bedbugreports.com, and also look at www.TripAdvisor.com (search for "bedbugs"). You'll find some pretty harrowing tales of these little suckers and how they can leave people scratching their heads (and face and legs and ankles, which is where they often bite) over how bedbugs have become the bane of many hoteliers' existence after they staged a comeback in recent years.Whether a hotel has bedbugs isn't necessarily a sign of its luxury status or lack thereof. Any establishment can become their home, sweet home, as long as they have their own buffet line (and that would be you). So how do you protect yourself from these night stalkers? First thing to do (assuming you've checked to make sure the hotel isn't on a "hot list") is to haul out that folding luggage rack with the metal legs, says Brian DiCicco, the president of Pest Management of Texas. The bugs have a hard time getting a grip on those legs, so your suitcase and its contents may be protected from an invasion. Next, "I actually take the sheets off the mattress and look at the seams on the bed — they can accumulate on the seams," DiCicco says. (The bugs are big enough to see, generally about 0.2 inch — about the size of an apple seed.) The headboard can be another home, so he removes it (it often "pops off," he says) and inspects. He also suggests looking for traces of fecal spotting, the dark brown stain that results from people's blood the bug slurped up. When DiCicco comes home from a trip, he puts his clothing in plastic trash bags and leaves his suitcases in the garage. He washes the clothing before returning it to his bedroom — just in case something has hitched a ride home. If there's any good news in this, it's that bedbugs don't generally transmit disease. But they are unsettling and expensive to eradicate. Catherine Hamm / Los Angeles Times This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service — if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read our FAQ page at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php |
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