CHAPTER XXVIII 



The Bedbug and Other Bloodsucking Bugs: Diseases Transmitted, 



Biology and Control ^ 



W. Dwight Pierce 



•Probably no species of bloodsucking insect is better known through- 

 out all the world than the bedbug, Cimex lectvlarius Linnaeus. This 

 species and its congener, C. hemipterus Fabricius (^rotvmdatus) Signoret, 

 live in the beds of man and suck human blood. There are a number of 

 related species, among which C. boueti Brumpt, in French Guinea, is also 

 said to suck the blood of man. The other species are bird and bat para- 

 sites. 



On account of the habit of the bedbug of sucking the blood of man, 

 but hiding by day in houses and vehicles, this species has many oppor- 

 tunities of transmitting diseases, provided that its methods of life con- 

 form with the requirements of the disease organisms. Girault has pointed 

 out that the bedbug will feed on mice, living or dead. This is a very 

 important point in considering its ability to transmit disease. 



Any disease which should be shown to be spread exclusively by the 

 bedbug will undoubtedly have a localized distribution, and 'is very likely 

 to be confined to certain buildings or groups of buildings, but on the 

 other hand may be spread long distances by travelers carrying the 

 bugs in their baggage and on their clothes. It will never be possible 

 for a disease carried by bedbugs to spread rapidly like a fly-borne oi 

 mosquito-borne disease. As bedbugs have been found in houses without 

 human occupants for two years or more, we must assume that they obtain 

 blood from rodents, and it is possible that in this way an infection might 

 be maintained in a dwelling. There is some very interesting literature on 

 the possible disease-transmitting role of bedbugs and this has been briefed 

 and arranged below in the same manner that the discussions of diseases 

 transmitted by other insects have been arranged in preceding lectures. 

 Certain other blood-sucking bugs are included in the discussion. 



'This lecture was presented November 18, 1918, and distributed January 25, 1919. 



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