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Bedbugs causing unrest

Associated Press file photo (2001)

Although bedbugs don't transmit diseases, they can cause rashes and trigger allergies, says entomologist Phil Koehler, left.

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By SHERRI ACKERMAN

sackerman@tampatrib.com

Published: April 20, 2009

TAMPA - Twenty-one years snuffing out bugs has taught Dominic Panzino a thing or two.

Like how you never open your suitcase in a hotel room until you rip off the bedsheets and inspect the mattress for bedbugs.

"You know that lip on the mattress?" asked Panzino. "Well, pull that back and you'll see 'em."

If the blood-sucking critters are hiding in the bed, they'll find a way into your luggage and, eventually, inside your home, says the supervisor for Haskell Termite & Pest Control.

Bedbugs are back with a vengeance, according to some national reports, and the lodging industry isn't the only one doing battle. Nursing homes, hospitals and shelters are also under siege.

"It's a significant problem in Florida" and has been since about 1999, said entomologist Philip Koehler of the University of Florida.

The state Department of Business and Professional Regulation, which monitors the hotel and motel industry, received 66 complaints about bedbugs from July to April 13 of this fiscal year, which ends June 30. The prior fiscal year, there were 99 complaints. There is no record of how many complaints were verified.

"Certainly any time a guest has a complaint we are concerned," said Geoff Luebkemann, spokesman for the Florida Restaurant & Lodging Association.

But right now the problem doesn't seem to have reached pandemic proportions, he said.

"Our view is it's not a great big concern right now," Luebkemann said.

Tell that to Kimberly Ann DeRoch, a Tampa woman who filed a lawsuit last year against an Orlando motel after she claimed she was chewed up by the reddish-brown bugs. The bites were so bad, DeRoch said she developed an infection and scars.

Her case is still working through the courts, the law firm representing DeRoch said Friday.

Although the bugs don't transmit diseases, they can cause rashes and trigger allergies, Koehler noted.

Bedbugs aren't just turning up in hotels, he said. They've infested nursing homes, hospitals and shelters. A few months ago, a local pest management company sent Koehler a cell phone photo of a wheelchair.

"There must've been 10,000 bugs on that chair," Koehler said.

The bedbug buzz got a boost last week, when the Environmental Protection Agency hosted its first bedbug summit. Koehler said he helped instigate the event in the hopes of getting a federal thumbs-up on using pesticides recently banned because of health concerns. The EPA said no.

That has pest control companies searching for alternatives. One idea is using oil-filled space heaters to kill the bugs, which can't survive temperatures of about 115 degrees, Koehler said. The bugs can be killed by fumigation, much the way termites are killed, but it takes about three times the gas, Panzino said.

For a large facility, such as a nursing home or high-rise apartment building, the cost of exterminating bedbugs can run as high as $150,000, Koehler said. Not to mention the expense and inconvenience of moving patients and residents.

"It's a really sad situation," he said.

Residential infestations aren't as common, but Panzino said he has had about eight to 10 calls this year compared with the usual one or two.

"This is probably the worst," he said, "but there hasn't been a major outbreak."

Senior Researcher Buddy Jaudon contributed to this report. Reporter Sherri Ackerman can be reached at (813) 259-7144.

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