Bed Bugs?!?

[NotQuiteCockney]

No, we don't have them. But one of our friends, back home, does. So we know we'll be, in some sense, exposed to them. How do we avoid taking them back to our rented accommodation? How do we avoid bringing them back home?

Basically, don't sit down anywhere and don't put your clothes down in the house.

Why don't your friends get them treated?

They are getting treatment, maybe they'll be clear by the time we're there (mid-aug) but I want to have a plan, just in case.

I've done a bit of net research since posting, and have decided to probably just not go into their house, at all.

I used to run low budget accommodation in London for backpackers. We had bedbug problems from time to time, people picked them up on their packs in other countries and arrived here with them.

Once they infest your home it's very difficult to get rid of them. They are flat and hide in 1mm gaps. They can live without water for 6 months and without food for 3 years.

I had a service contract with rentokil which cost me £400 a month for one building and they couldn's shift them. People refused to pay rent and it nearly bankrupted me, I had to sell the building in the end. When I saw any sign of them in the other houses I got an independent pest control company in who used double the legal dose of insecticide which did work.

I think not going to their house is absolutely sensible.

Yeah, they essentially run low-budget accommodation over their house, which is how they got in.

Annoyingly, I've just now remembered that my sister has my Toronto travel cot (I own one in London, one in Oxfordshire, one in Montreal, and one in Toronto. I think there's another one around somewhere.). Looks like I'm buying a second Toronto travel cot. And getting sheets for it, or something.