Hearth To Hearth

by Donna Tavano

Vampire Season 

          It’s October, that celebrated season of beasties and ghouls.  Children fear going to sleep in the dark because a zombie’s bony fingers might dart out from beneath the bed and snatch them into oblivion.  We adults, of course, attempt to rid them of such silly notions and chuckle patronizingly as we tuck the little ones in, all the while pooh-poohing the reality of blood-sucking vampires.

                Well, Mr. and Mrs. Grown-up, what if someone proved to you that blood sucking vampires really do exist and may be soon coming to a bedroom near you!  Creepy Halloween tale — or truth?  And the answer is….Truth.  There are indeed hideous things that go creep in the night, what’s more, they are nearly invisible, live to drink your blood, can exist without eating for 18 months (dieters pay attention), and cost you thousands of dollars, if not your sanity.  Say hello to Cimex lectularius, aka the bedbug.

                For most of us in the U.S. today, knowledge of bedbugs is limited to a child’s night time rhyme, “Sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite,” or the cute Fisher Price light-up toy, or was that a firefly…Who cares, beds and bugs are a bad combo, however you swat it.

                Almost eradicated in the U.S. decades ago, our country is experiencing a resurgence of the insects.  Experts say this is due to environmental controls on pesticides and an increase in global travel.  A person may discover an infestation if they develop itchy bites and welts from the little buggers.  They are most active at dawn, just before sunrise.  Stimulated by carbon dioxide, the creature stabs us with two hollow fangs.  It then efficiently injects its saliva with anticoagulants and anesthetics (how considerate) with one straw and sucks up blood with the other.

                The oldest fossilized bedbug on record lived 3,500 years ago.  Aristophanes included them in plays and in one WWI account of an East African campaign, the military suffered a pestilence of the monsters when the insects invaded the cork linings of the soldier’s helmets, attacking them incessantly.  War is hell, but bugs too?  Years ago, the bugs were common in laundries, upholstery shops, trains, coatrooms, moving vans and hospitals.  They prefer wood and fabric to metal and plastic.  For some reason the insidious vampires infest chicken farms ---kind of like sitting ducks --- apologies for so fowl an attempt at humor.

                The problem of bedbugs is often hidden, quite literally, but because victims mistake their symptoms for flea bites or, as with lice, fear social repercussions, they are too embarrassed to seek help in eliminating them.  Fifty percent of the population suffers no reaction to their bites and have no idea they are playing host to colonies of the critters.  Though they don’t carry disease like fleas or ticks, it is believed they contribute to asthmatic reactions especially in urban public housing.  Just last week, Boston University students in an apartment building were relocated to exterminate bedbugs.  Some of our finest hotels have had to deal with the problem, even on Cape Cod.  Rich or poor, bedbugs will slide under your door.

                Eliminating the creeps is expensive and time consuming.  It takes 120 degrees for an extended period,  or three days in the deep freeze to kill the bugs on clothing.  Beware hitchhikers on used furniture and clothing from second hand shops, yard sales and Craigslist purchases.  Often a victim, after learning of an infestation, will move from the bed to a sofa, friend’s house or motel.  Guess who they bring as an uninvited guest? 

                Their flat bodies allow them to travel along pipes and vents, or through cracks to adjoining apartments.  Some exterminators are now using trained canines to sniff them out with great accuracy.  The cost of eradication, replacing possessions, mental health issues, medical bills and potential lawsuits is staggering.

                These base life forms are already becoming immune to certain pesticides.  Oddly enough, there may be one socially redeeming use for them, in forensics.  Since they don’t stay on the host, but hang out near the bed after eating, research is centering on the DNA of blood on which they’ve dined, as a possible clue to investigate the presence of a person involved in a crime.

                So, it’s true, not all monsters are imaginary, or confined to All Hallow’s Eve.  If you ever hear someone say, “Nighty-night, sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite,” get thyself to a phone book quick for an exterminator’s number…they might not be kidding….

10/16/08