More Bed Bug Infestations

The legendary bed bugs pests, once thought to have been eradicated, are making an unwelcome reappearance, worldwide, as these competent little travelers stow away in luggage and clothing. From pilots, to business travelers, bed bugs are being unknowingly spread abroad.

One passenger claims that some bed bugs have managed to get on board airplanes, showing that bed bugs are not just to be found on beds anymore. She says she was bitten by the bugs while flying on a British Airways flight from L.A. to Bangalore.

Zane Selkirk, 28, a business executive for the Internet company Yahoo!'s media group, reveals she first saw the bed bugs on her airline-provided blanket and on her finger, around three hours into the first leg of her journey, which was between Los Angeles and London's Heathrow Airport. She also claimed she had been bitten on a flight to Bangalore a few weeks before.

Selkirk said "During the first flight, I turned on my light to find bugs crawling on my blanket and a bedbug-blood-spattered shirt." When she left the 10-hour flight on the return journey from Bangalore to London, she found her body literally covered with 90 bug bites. "The worst part was the non-existent customer service throughout the ten-day ordeal."

Selkirk posted photos of her bites on the Internet, unhappy with BA's initial response.

The airline fumigated one of the aircraft on which it corroborated that there had been an infestation of bugs and apologized to the woman for her nightmare. A BA spokesman confirmed that two planes were taken out and had to be treated before being returning back into service.

A spokesman said "British Airways operates more than 250,000 flights every year, and reports of bed bugs onboard are extremely rare".

Authorities in New York, where there are 100,000 teachers and 1.1 million students, admitted in 2010 that the bed bug plague had attained 'an unprecedented rate of spread'. They promised $500,000 to improve public awareness.

A procedure for dealing with individual cases was introduced into schools, along with the goal of greater communication between schools and parents.

However, these measures seem to have failed because numerous homes are already infected. Private homes continue being the source of most infestations, as the bed bugs travel in bags and on the clothes of their hosts, continuing the spread.

As bed bugs are not disease carriers, the damage is psychological rather than long term physical discomfort. The bugs can go a whole year without eating, making them very difficult to be gotten rid of.

It requires persistence to eliminate them.