Bedbugs on rise in pest world

They are the size of a poppy seed and feed on warm blood.

They latch onto shoes, clothing or luggage and "hitchhike" across the world.

After a good meal, they hide within small cracks of headboards, mattress cushions and carpet.

They're bedbugs, and they quickly have become the pest of the 21st century in the United States.

In the past three years, they've found homes at Harrah's, Luxor and Excalibur. Downtown, they have spent time at the Four Queens and Golden Nugget.

"They are not like flies or cockroaches that hang around garbage and junk. Their only meal is blood. They are great hitchhikers,'' said Cindy Mannes, vice president of the National Pest Management Association, a nonprofit trade association for the pest control industry.

Today, roughly 70 percent of all calls to pest control services nationwide concern bedbugs, Mannes said.

"Prior to 2000, companies got one or two calls a year, maybe. We are seeing them more in schools, college dormitories, hotels and homes. They like people,'' Mannes said. "Places like Las Vegas and other resort areas, where a lot of people congregate, all have the right elements in place for bedbugs. But that doesn't mean Vegas is worse than any other place.''

Overall, bedbug complaints have increased in Southern Nevada the past three years. About two to three complaints a week were being reported at times last year; this year, Southern Nevada Health District environmental officials say bedbug complaints are down a bit but are still more frequent than in years past.

The majority of the complaints are made by apartment residents and people living in extended-stay properties such as motels.

Guests of Strip resorts also, on occasion, complain of bedbugs at Las Vegas hotels and file complaints with the Health District.

During a tourism security conference in Las Vegas last year, a Boyd Gaming risk management official showed slides of bedbugs clinging to the side of a mattress inside an unidentified hotel room.

Bedbugs, the officials said, seem to be increasing in Las Vegas and "not only at run-down hotels but at some of the nicer properties."

The Review-Journal made requests for recent records on 33 resort properties around the Las Vegas Valley. Of these, 12 had complaints lodged against them. According to Health District records, bedbugs were found in five of them by the property's contracted pest control company.

Bedbugs were discovered after hotel guests complained to property management about being bitten.

The Health District isn't in the business of treating for bedbugs, said Gregg Wears, supervisor for the environmental health office that handles the Strip properties.

Instead, the agency ensures that the property has followed protocol to correct the problem. If a complaint has been filed, hotel management is responsible for hiring a pest control company to do an inspection and treat the room.

In most cases, pest control companies already have inspected and treated resort rooms before the Health District receives a complaint from a hotel guest. In some cases, the Health District will send an environmental health specialist to conduct an investigation, Wears said.

Between 2004 and January 2007, hotel guests at Paris Las Vegas, Monte Carlo, New York-New York, The Venetian, Circus Circus, Sahara and MGM Grand filed bedbug complaints with the Health District. The reports indicate that no bedbugs were found when pest control officials responded.

"There isn't any place immune. We have received calls from people regarding major Strip properties, calls from extended-stay properties and hotels and motels,'' Wears said.

"The good news, even though the bites itch and raise welts, (is) bedbugs have never been associated with transmission of any kind of disease. If I'm in the room tonight, somebody else was in the room yesterday; I'm not going to get whatever they had. But bedbugs can become an expensive nuisance because it is time- consuming and labor-intensive to inspect for them.''

Officials from some of Las Vegas' megaresorts say tourists here are no more at risk of being bitten than at any other major U.S. destination city.

They also say the increase in international travel, especially from more exotic places, adds to the bedbug problem.

"We do take the matter very seriously and have a very detailed policy and procedure once a guest does have a complaint of bedbugs," said Alberto Lopez, spokesman for Harrah's Entertainment.

Bedbugs were discovered at the company's flagship hotel in September.

According to Health District reports, Harrah's management contacted Ecolab, a pest control company, after receiving the complaint. Bedbugs were found in the guest's room, which was treated along with eight adjacent rooms as a precaution.

The mattresses and box springs of the beds in the infested room were removed.

"Keep in mind, this was just one incident within a 12-month period,'' Lopez said. "We are continuously maintaining rooms, both for pre-check-in and post-check-out."

The Health District received multiple bedbug complaints for some resort properties.

Dead bedbugs were discovered at the Luxor in 2004, and the Health District received a bedbug complaint at the hotel last year. No bedbugs were found on the latter occasion.

In September 2005, the Health District received a complaint about bedbugs at the MGM Grand.

An Ecolab inspection found none. In March 2006, the Health District received another bedbug complaint from an MGM guest. When the Health District followed up with MGM, housekeeping and Ecolab records showed that the MGM actually had received three complaints for three separate rooms.

Bedbug activity was not found in any of the three rooms.

The Four Queens also has received multiple complaints. In 2005, bedbugs were found in one room, and in February 2006, bedbugs were found in two rooms, according to Health District reports.

The Sahara has received two bedbug complaints during the time period, one in 2004 and another in 2005.

It is unclear from Health District reports whether bedbugs actually were found in those rooms. In both cases, the rooms were put out of order and treated.

Most Las Vegas hotels have good policies in place to prevent pest infestations as well as to handle situations if bugs are found, Health District officials said.

Wears said that sometimes hotel guests confuse bedbug bites for other things unrelated to their hotel stay.

"A high percentage, regrettably, are false claims,'' he said.

During inspections, either by the Health District or a pest control company, rooms typically are stripped of bedding, beginning with pillows.

"In most cases we do a very close investigation using a flashlight, and sometimes we've used magnifying glasses,'' Wears said. "Our inspectors are wearing gloves. ... We also check the wood frames where the mattress meets the (bed) frame.''

Inspectors are searching for live or dead bedbugs, as well as any other evidence of their presence, such as skin left behind or eggs that have been laid.

"We don't go out and treat; we are investigators and regulators,'' Wears said. "We want people from professional pest control companies to treat. ... In a hotel, because the bedbugs can travel from room to room, if we find one room is infected, we close rooms directly above and below it as well as across from and adjacent to it on both sides.''

Although resorts are not required to report to the Health District when a guest has a bedbug complaint, Steve Goode, environmental health manager, said he doesn't believe there would be a significant increase in reports of bedbug infestations if such a requirement were in place.

He said tourists, stateside and international, are savvy enough to know to call a local health authority with such complaints.

"I believe that most stateside tourists come from areas with a local health authority, and they have an understanding that the health department is responsible for anything that relates to health, including the perceived lack of cleanliness which seems to be associated with bedbugs,'' Goode said in an e-mail.

In addition to inspections, the Health District is responsible for educating businesses as well as individual homeowners about bedbugs and what steps can be taken to prevent them.

Some hotels need refresher courses on the protocol for handling bedbug complaints, though.

In January, a guest of The Venetian reported a bedbug problem to the Health District. The guest had stayed at the hotel Jan. 5-7 but reported the incident to the hotel Jan. 9.

According to a Health District report, Ecolab wasn't asked to inspect the room until Jan. 18. The room had been rented twice after hotel management received the initial complaint.

Although no bedbugs were found, a Health District inspector advised Venetian management that, in the future, rooms suspected of having bedbugs should be vacated immediately upon the learning of possible bedbug activity.

If the room is occupied, guests are to be transferred to another room so that a pest control company can inspect or treat it, health officials said.

Some hotels and motels have set up bedbug control departments.

Alan Feldman, a spokesman for MGM Mirage, said the concept of prevention is expensive considering how rarely bedbugs show up, but it is necessary.

He said that MGM Mirage, which owns 10 properties in Nevada, is putting a special insecticide inside the dry wall of all new properties being built to prevent bedbugs and other pests. Properties being remodeled also are getting the insecticide, he said.

"The reality of it is the nature of this kind of pest is that it is brought in by an outside person. Once they are in, you really have to isolate the room and deal with it in a pretty aggressive way,'' Feldman said.

"At the least, it is several hundred dollars, and depending on what kind of remediation, it can go higher than that. The few occasions we have heard of a room with a bedbug complaint, we didn't have to go beyond one room.''

Mannes said that for some people, being bitten by a bedbug only once can play on the psyche.

"Think about it. You go to bed at night and something crawls on you and sucks your blood. When you wake up, you may or may not have any bite marks, but it has happened,'' Mannes said.

"Now you may never know whether or not you were bitten and may never even get an itch, but the question is, are you still OK with something crawling on you?''

DDT BAN REOPENED DOOR, EXPERTS SAY

There are several theories behind the resurgence of bedbugs, the small wingless insect that has made a comeback in the United States.

International travel is at the top of the list. That's because bedbugs travel with people, sometimes in luggage.

But some experts believe the ban of a pesticide once used to eradicate insect pests is to blame.

That chemical, dichloro-diphenyl-trichloreothane, or DDT, was developed and used during World War II to combat malaria, typhus and other insect-borne diseases common among U.S. troops returning home.

The pesticide also was used to control insects on farms and forest lands, around homes and gardens, and for industrial and commercial purposes. Insect infestations declined dramatically once DDT began to be used, said Gregg Wears, supervisor of the Southern Nevada Health District's Strip environmental health office.

"Then we discovered DDT was bad for everybody ... bad for our health and the environment, so it was outlawed,'' Wears said.

Since the ban, the bedbug population has increased, said Cindy Mannes, vice president of the National Pest Management Association.

Although other chemicals that don't threaten the environment are being used to get rid of insect pests, both Mannes and Wears say they aren't as effective.

"These methods are used as a repellent, not a killer,'' Wears said. "Then add to that a comeback in international travel, especially from more exotic places, and we have more bedbugs.''

A resurgence of bedbugs "tells us on the surface that current technology is not as effective as the old technology,'' Wears said. "If there's not some form of abatement, then we're looking at this thing expanding to become more common and more of a nuisance to the individual hotel, to the tourist or to us in our home. It's a matter of time before we bring these things home with us. It happened to one of my inspectors.''