Bedbug battle fallout: rise in poisonings

A global resurgence of bedbugs has triggered a related rise in poisonings stemming from the misuse of insecticides, with more than half the U.S. cases reported in New York City.

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention investigation found evidence of people becoming so frustrated with the bloodsucking insects that they were endangering their lives to stop the bites.

The report detailed 111 toxic exposures that occurred between 2003 and 2010 in seven states. There were 82 in New York, 64 of them in the city. Nationally, the 39 poisonings reported in 2010 were more than double the previous year's tally.

A North Carolina woman died last year following an all-out assault on bedbugs in her home. Her death is the nation's first attributed to eradication efforts.

The findings didn't surprise members of the Nassau County Bed Bug Task Force, a group formed in the wake of growing reports about the pests and a need to educate the public.

If the new research is any guide, many homeowners, landlords and tenants have no idea what to do about bedbugs, task force members said.

Public health researchers found that people are being sickened by a variety of toxic compounds -- mostly pyrethroid and pyrethrin insecticides -- which are effective against bedbugs but dangerous when misused.

The bugs are resistant to numerous pesticides and treatment is best left to professionals, said Jody Gangloff-Kaufmann, an urban entomologist with Cornell University's Integrated Pest Management Program in Farmingdale.

Reddish brown, wingless and requiring regular meals of human blood, bedbugs vanished from the United States shortly after World War II, the result of widespread applications of DDT, which was banned in 1972, Gangloff-Kaufmann said.

She traces the creatures' resurgence to about a decade ago. Many of the bugs began proliferating in hotels and were inadvertently spread around the globe by travelers.

Gangloff-Kaufmann calls the insects equal opportunity nuisances. They've turned up in tony neighborhoods as well as public housing.

"Those who can afford it," she said, "spend about $5,000 and the bedbugs are wiped out in a day."

Those who can't foot the bill are forced to do the best they can.

Because infestations have been reported throughout Long Island, Suffolk County health and social service experts have been invited to join the Nassau task force.

Rene Fiechter, task force co-chairman, said the group's meetings attract standing room-only crowds.

"Many people feel helpless when . . . [bedbugs] invade," he said. "They cause a lot of anxiety and depression."

Visiting nurses, police officers and social workers, Fiechter said, harbor fears of getting bugs on their clothing while in infested homes. They're especially leery of hoarders.

The lone confirmed death involved a Rocky Mount, N.C., woman. Lilah Gray, 65, and her husband applied insecticide to their bed and the baseboards and walls of their home.

Nine cans of an insecticide fogger were released in the home the same day, according to the CDC report.

The bed was treated again two days later, and nine cans of a different fogger were used. Desperate, Gray then applied insecticide to her skin and hair, which she covered with a plastic bag.

Two days after that, her husband found her unresponsive and rushed her to the hospital. She died May 26, 2010, of respiratory failure.

TO AVOID ILLNESS

EXPOSURE SYMPTOMS

-- Newsday research