QUESTION:

Recently on a bed bug job the most heavily infested bedroom housed 2 human adults and a dog (that routinely sleeps with them at night). On my second trip I found a large number of dead bedbugs, along with dog hair, at the foot of the bed in Climb-up interceptors I previously installed. If the dog is treated for fleas with a fipronil product (it is not currently being treated with anything), will some of the bed bugs be killed when they bite the dog? Are any products approved for human use (pills or topical cream) that affect bedbugs?

ANSWER:

I just returned from the NPMA Conference in New Orleans, and I will tell you that THE hot topic was bed bugs. I attended about 8 separate sessions on bed bugs that included research and product updates, and also visited many vendor booths that offered their products and solutions for this awful pest. In addition to coming home just a tad more paranoid myself, I can say with confidence that there are NO medicines of any kind that a human can take or even use on themselves that will kill, repel, annoy, bother, or amuse a bed bug. In addition I sincerely doubt that the flea products used on pets would affect bed bugs either, or these would have been discussed or presented somewhere in the NPMA programs.

The fipronil on-animal products are supposed to kill fleas or ticks by spreading over the dog after application by the movement of oils in the product. According to the manufacturers this could leave as much as 3 months of effective protection on the pet. Now, I will say that I really do not know whether or not this slight amount of fipronil on a dog could then kill a bed bug that crawls on it to feed, nor whether that bed bug could carry some of the active ingredient back to its harborage and pass it on to other bed bugs there. But, because bed bugs feed only for a few minutes and then leave the blood host they would be exposed to FAR less active ingredient than the flea or tick that is permanently on a dog, and thus exposed to a much greater amount of the a.i. over a much longer period of time. And, since these topical products are not labeled for use against bed bugs it would be important for us not to suggest their use to a pet owner.

Would that it were that easy, but it still remains that eliminating The Common Bed Bug is going to involve a lot of time and hard work. One interesting comment that I heard several times is that Laundering clothing and other washable materials to kill bed bugs is not necessary if those items can also be placed in the dryer. The dryer alone, at a HOT setting for at least 30 minutes, is enough to kill all bed bugs and their eggs, and it is not necessary to do both a hot wash and hot dry. This makes it a lot simpler for the homeowner, and some apartment managers are even making the complex's dryers available for FREE to encourage tenants to use them. They make up for it by increasing the cost to use the washers, but having free dryers adds at least a bit more certainty that people will use this heat technique on their clothing and other items when they return from vacations or visits to other homes.

There also is at least one interesting new "Active" bed bug monitor coming onto the market that shows high effectiveness at attracting and trapping bed bugs. It still in ONLY a monitor, but may be a bit more reliable at showing you whether or not bed bugs are in a room. This will be available sometime early in 2012 and without a doubt you will hear about it.

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