If you travel for the holidays, you may want to keep in mind some steps to prevent bringing bed bugs home with you. Jennine Wolf with Washington County Environmental Health shares the parasitic insects aren’t only found in beds, “Being aware that you can pick them up from a theater seat, you can pick them up from a bus, you can pick them up from a booth in a restaurant, it’s being aware you can pick them up just about anywhere, so you need to be conscious of how you can bring them back to your house.” The small, flat, brown insects feed on the blood of people and animals while they sleep. They do not transmit disease when they bite people but can leave small red marks on the skin.

Wolf says when she travels she keeps her luggage away from the beds and any clothing she wears on the trip, especially pajamas, gets put into a plastic bag and tied shut. She says once she gets home the fabric goes in the dryer, “All the clothes I would put in the dryer, not the washer. I would put it in the dryer first because it’s the heat that kills the eggs. And the eggs, that’s the only thing that kills eggs is the heat. So the eggs are the biggest downfall in getting rid of bed bugs. And so you want to make sure that you put everything you can into the dryer for at least 45 minutes.” She says another step people can take this time of year is leaving their coats in the car when they go to parties, instead of adding them to a pile of other coats.

Bed bugs can be in any household, regardless of income and cleanliness. Wolf says if you do get bed bugs, contact her office at (319) 653-7782 or call an exterminator with experience handling such situations.