Safe Haven from Bloodsuckers

"He had a cheery 'Hello', he wasn't slurring his words, he was walking more upright and purposefully.  He wasn't mentally ill at all.  He was suffering the insidious effects of bedbugs."
Sharon Younger, tenant activist

Who could blame someone for feeling miserable when they've been inundated by the invidious scourge of an bedbug infestation.  Apart from the perceived shame of it, the isolating effect that occurs if word ever gets out that someone's home has been invaded by those difficult to extract pests that take their toll on people as they sleep, vulnerable and victimized.

Ms. Younger recounts how the man who lived in an apartment in the same building she lived in, in Toronto looked when she first saw him.  "He was oblivious to how bad his problem was.  There were bugs going through his hair, coming out of his ear, blood-soaked tissues.  There were thousands and thousands in his apartment."

Now that is a dreadful description of a plague of bedbugs making life an absolute misery for someone; disgusting, disquieting, dismal, dysfunctional.  The man, she said, used to get about, shuffling like a zombie through the night-time hallways of the apartment.  Action was obviously needed.  And since she was a tenant activist she acted.

She and others set about the work required to cleanse affected apartments of their bedbug infestation.  It's hard to imagine bedbugs having returned to infest modern day society.  When one thinks of the creatures their presence represents squalid uncleanliness, unhygienic conditions.  But bedbugs now present as a huge problem in first class hotels; unsuspecting guests bring them home.

And a new Canadian study appears to offer scientific support for what people who have observed the effects of bedbug infestation firsthand conclude.  Beyond the itching and scratching, people suffer anxiety disorder symptoms, sleeplessness and depression.  The psychological effect of living with fears and concerns related to bedbugs and how to expunge them from an environment is not pleasant.

"The issue with bedbugs is that you're going to bed and you know that at any time some insect will bite you, and you're at your most vulnerable, you're sleeping.  You cannot protect yourself."  Helpless and hapless is what Dr. Stephane Perron of Montreal's public health department described.  Surveys reveal that almost 3% of Montreal's residents struggle with the problem of bedbugs.

Research published in the British Medical Journal Open resulted from participants completing a standard questionnaire designed to assess symptoms of depression, anxiety and other mental-health problems associated specifically with problems relating to bedbug infestations.  Those with such problems discovered to be five times as likely to suffer from anxiety disorders and sleep disturbance.

"You try not sleeping for days, weeks, months, years on end.  It doesn't just make you a bear, it changes your entire personality.  You become withdrawn, anti-social, you fly off the handle more easily."

The solution?  Dogged work in washing bedding and clothing, and placing everything into bags.  Furniture and belongings steamed while a pest control worker sprays the home the first time, and repeats the process two weeks later.  And if that doesn't work, repeat until it does. 

Toronto's Woodgreen Community Services first began receiving call about bedbugs in 2004.  It has been struggling ever since to get on top of the problem.  And it has produced a manual on how best to cope with bedbugs.

 "It is very, very stressful for [bedbug victims], especially people who have limited resources and who don't always have a friendly landlord who is going to assist them in dealing with it.  It's one of those things it's hard to escape from", said the agency's CEO.