411: Bedbug Blight
Ugh, we like to live by the philosophy that if we ignore something, it'll go away. Unfortunately, the resurgence of bedbugs gets so much ink in the press we can't ignore it. At this point we've taken to sleeping with a flashlight, our body hermetically sealed in Hefty bags. According to BoingBoing (via the LA Times):
New York City apartment dwellers lodged 4,638 bedbug complaints in fiscal 2006, up from none three years earlier. Complaints ballooned 67% in the first half of this year from their pace a year earlier.
Bedbugs were virtually eradicated from the U.S. in the 1940s and 1950s, Miller said. The cause of their resurgence is not officially known, though theories include increased international travel in which the bugs hitch a ride on clothing or in luggage and decreased use of pesticides such as DDT.
Here's the thing, we need to bring back the DDT. We know that kills the fuckers. Listen, We're all up for a little extra toxicity if it ends this urban plague. What's a few more deadly chemicals in our already compromised bloodstream? We just want peace of mind.
Bedbug "Plague"Continues To Grow [BoingBoing]
Labels:
411,
Bedbugs,
Urban Plagues
1 comment:
What's really disturbing is that NYC's 4600 comlaints in one year (cited in your blurb from the article) really misrepresents the scope of this problem. According to a recent Village Voice Article, Pest Away (one NYC PCO) claims to get 100 bed bug calls per day, 85 of which are actual cases. Multiply 85 x 5 days a week x 52 weeks a year, and that one pest control operator is seeing 22,000 homes with bed bugs per year. And there are HUNDREDS of PCOs in the NYC area, most of whom treat bed bugs. The reason the city's own statistics are so woefully inaccurate is because they're based on calls to 311 to report housing violations. But most tenants and all homeowners do NOT call 311 to report pests. They call their landlords or they call a pest control operator. The local government needs to keep a registry of infestations which isn't tied to reports of housing violations, so we can see how this is spreading and where. For now, our mayor has his head in the sand.
http://bedbugger.com
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