Response to bb Panic

And anyone who ever uses a hotel and is not already aware that this is a continuing risk is a fool. All hotel rooms everywhere should be routinely checked when you check in and care should always be taken with luggage after a trip assuming there is a hitchhiker. It has been true for decades. THEY are everywhere.

Thanks Bets for the post and the link (although it's behind a paywall). I was shocked to read in the BBC link Stuart provided yesterday that they are postulating that one of the reason there might be an increase in bedbugs is the decrease in cockroaches which are bedbug predators, lol. Having lived in FL for many years I am not a fan of cockroaches either!!

I guess I'm very naive and must be very lucky. I've never checked hotel rooms for bed bugs nor have I isolated my luggage when I return home.

Pam it only has to happen to you once to make you a believer. We had it in Amsterdam in a very nice boutique hotel about 25 or so years ago. It was horrifying to wake up with blood spots on our sheets and slowly realize what it must be. We have checked carefully ever since and discarded our luggage after that trip. The cost if you import them into your home is really high and they are hard to eradicate. Luckily we knew about them in the creepiest way possible and so were able to prevent importing them.

They are also in theatres and libraries.

There was a serious infestation in Cincinnati quite a few years ago, and teachers were finding them in classrooms brought in by kids. A good friend of mine was an elementary school teacher, and she was very nervous about them. As soon as she got home, she immediately headed for the basement, removed all her clothes, washed and dried them at the highest settings, and took a shower in the basement. Only then did she head upstairs. The clothes she wore to school stayed in the basement and she got dressed there in the morning. I thought it was a bit overkill but didn't dare argue with her about it. :-)

I checked the France bedbug registry today and none of the hotels included in the Paris and the Heart of France tour are listed, for what that's worth. There are lots of tips on the internet about avoiding parasitic hitchhikers while traveling but the most logical to me are 1) when entering the room immediate put your luggage in the bathtub or on a table pulled away from the wall. Then 2) do a careful inspection of the bedding, bed, wall paper, electrical outlets and baseboards. Personally I plan to keep my luggage in the bathroom because apparently the critters don't like tile.

@cholly - where is this registry?

cholly302, its that they can't climb smooth surfaces. Add 'don't leave clothes on the floor' to your list.

where is this registry?

https://hotelbedbugreports.com/hotels/France

My brother, a retired forester, had coffee today with one of his old friends, a retired entomologist with the US Forest Service. Rog was telling Lee about this and Lee said he'd read somewhere recently in an entomology journal that in Northern Europe there has been a 75% decrease in flying insects to which cockroaches belong. Cockroaches he said, go for slow and lazy bugs, lol. He'd going to look for the journal article which might be an interesting read.

Thank you Janet for the extra information. I'm sure that was awful to wake up with bites.

We oddly didn't break out or suffer any personal consequences except extreme creeped outedness but it has made me very cautious every since. We have never found bedbug signs but I always check. It may be that it is like some allergies -- first bite nothing -- and the later you react if bitten again.

I can believe it about the significant reduction in flying insects. It seems so weird to be able to leave windows wide open in Europe and nary a house fly or other flying creature. We have been opening our French doors at the back of the house in the evenings to avoid turning on the air conditioning during this transition between seasons. Bring out the fly swatters.

"We oddly didn't break out or suffer any personal consequences except extreme creeped outedness but it has made me very cautious every since."

Totally understand that....it's the yuck factor that is the worst.

Vandabrud...interesting. I had not thought of the notion that the decrease in flying insects had an impact on open windows. We have had the invasion of hatching aphids lately so no open doors but screened windows are OK, lol. There, again, no injury from the aphids just in your mouth, eyes, nose....

FYI. We've never needed screens here in a lot of Europe. In fact, we need them more now than we did 10, 20, 30 years ago because we have more mosquitoes. So that is irrelevant. We've never had screens like in North America but would hang flypaper over the dining table to trap flies.

Bets, I was wondering about that. When I first started traveling to Europe in the 1990s, I remember windows being open all the time and no bugs, flies or mosquitos in sight. That's too bad it has changed (sigh).