Sudburians may be the happiest in Canada, as one survey found, but it looks like we are also among the itchiest.
A recent report from Orkin, a national pest-control company, ranks Sudbury eighth in the country for bedbug infestations.
That's behind Toronto -- the bedbug capital -- and a few other major centres, but well ahead of Sault Ste. Marie (No. 23) and other northern communities.
The rankings were based on the number of calls Orkin received in each centre over the course of a year (from July 1 of last year to June 30 of this year) for residential and commercial bedbug treatments.
The local Orkin outlet services a broad area of the North, but the city's placement in the Top 10 was based on calls specific to Greater Sudbury, which has experienced a bigger outbreak of the biters in recent years.
"A lot of it has to do with travellers," says Andre Briere, manager of the Orkin branch in Sudbury. "People travel a lot more, and if you look at the list, it's usually Toronto, Vancouver, wherever there's international airports, that are in first, second, third. That's where it stems from."
Briere says the bloodsucking bugs aren't indigenous and weren't a major issue a decade ago in Sudbury, but they've become more prominent as more people trot the globe -- or simply trot down the highway to Canada's bedbug capital.
"Seven or eight years ago Toronto was doing a lot of bedbug work, and we were just barely getting into it," he says. "It's nothing for people now in Sudbury to go down and grab a Jays game and come back. The hotel they're staying in may have some, and next thing you know they're bringing them back home."
The bugs like to "hitch rides in luggage and clothes," he says, and will pop out -- mostly unseen -- when people unpack.
Adult bedbugs are visible to the naked eye, Briere notes, but they tend to hide along the seams of beds and in other crevices, and may go undetected for weeks. The eggs of the insects, meanwhile, are "the size and colour of a grain of salt," he says.
Once established, the unwelcome guests are hard to evict, or eradicate.
"The reason it's causing such a problem is we don't have a magic wand where we can walk into a room and spray a chemical and they're dead," says Briere.
Rather, it's a three-step process to de-bug a household, or hotel room.
Orkin staff will go in first to blast an infested area with steam, he says, as only heat will kill the eggs. Then they apply a chemical treatment to kill the adult bugs. Finally they come back for another round of spraying to catch any nymphs that may have hatched from overlooked eggs.
"It's not walk in and walk out," says the pest control expert.
High-rise apartment buildings and big hotels are particularly susceptible to bedbug issues, he says, given the population density and the comings and goings of people toting clothes and furniture.
Briere advises against picking up a couch or mattress from a yard sale, and says travellers should leave their luggage in a garage or other outbuilding for a week or so after returning home. You should also put your clothing in the dryer and run it at the highest temperature for at least 15 minutes.
If you're checking into a room, meanwhile, "put your luggage in the bathtub," Briere suggests, or on an elevated rack, until you have a chance to inspect the premises for evidence of bedbugs, such as blood stains, droppings, dead bugs and eggs.
Unlike with some other pests, like cockroaches or ants, cleanliness isn't a big factor in whether or not a building will wind up with bedbugs.
"It has nothing to do with sanitation," says Briere. "You could have a five-star hotel where somebody has brought them in, while a one-star hotel won't have any."
People tend to flinch at the mere thought of bedbugs, probably because they inhabit beds, not to mention feed on blood. But they are not known to transmit disease, Briere says, and can't hop or fly about, like fleas, so in some ways are cleaner and more containable than other pests.
Still, they are definitely an unpleasant thing to have around, and can cause extreme itchiness, allergic reactions and insomnia.
Briere says the critters tend to peak in summer, or after Christmas, when people do the most travelling.
In a release accompanying its list of bedbug cities, Orkin Canada says it "expects this to be a bumper year for bedbugs."
Anyone detecting signs of bedbugs is advised to seek expert advice to prevent widespread infestation.
For more information about bedbug prevention and ways to counter an outbreak, visit orkincanada.ca.
You can also learn more about bedbugs and how to report them by visiting the Sudbury and District Health Unit's page on the insects at http://www.sdhu.com/health-topics-programs/housing/bedbugs.
jmoodie@postmedia.com
Top 10 Bedbug Cities
1. Toronto
2. Winnipeg
3. Vancouver
4. Ottawa
5. St. John's
6. Edmonton
7. Halifax
8. Sudbury
9. Scarborough
10. Calgary
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Sudbury on Top 10 list for bedbugs - The Sudbury Star
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