Why are bed bugs becoming harder to kill?

It is no secrete that over the last decade bed bugs have made a resurgence into the public spotlight. We hear a lot of speculation around as to why this has happened. It is a combination of things, but one of the main reasons is the bed bugs ability to develop resistance against chemicals that are widely used on the market today.

Purdue researchers found that in a study of 5 different bed bug populations around America that 25% of the population survived after being exposed to chemicals on the market today.

Another scary thing is that as far as we know there are no new chemical bed bug products even in the R&D phase, meaning it could be many years before the market sees any new chemical products to fight bed bugs. For those of you not involved in the chemical world it can cost up to $20 million + to bring a brand new chemical product to market. With that being said there are only a few manufacturers that could even accomplish this.

Experts around the world are promoting alternative sources of bed bug remediation, but that is not always the most cost prohibitive move.

Speaking in regards to multi-family one of the best things you can do is be proactive towards bed bugs. A few things apartment managers can do to manage bed bug populations is to inspect units as they submit their notice to vacate and to always inspect adjoining units that are confirmed to have bed bug issues.

Original article is from TIME publication.