A Carleton student spotted bed bugs on a bench in the Loeb Building on Oct. 14.
Third-year journalism student Elaine Tamblyn-Watts said she was finishing a paper on campus when she decided to take a short nap on the bench. Spotting what she thought was a spider, on a closer look she discovered it was a bed bug.
She said she immediately switched her clothes and went home. The bed bug was a shock, she said, and she was worried.
“I think they can spread,” she said. “They can transfer onto things via fabric, so if people are sitting there, they can latch onto your clothes, lay eggs on your clothes and contaminate them, which can spread to residences, student housing, or even bench-to-bench in different buildings.”
Tamblyn-Watts said she believes this is a contamination risk, and students need to know what might be lurking on campus.
“I don’t think people are prepared for it. Most people would notice bed bugs because of where they sleep at night and they notice the bites on them,” she said. “People won’t know where they get them, and then they’ll suddenly see them in their apartment and know that they have them.”
Vice-president (facilities planning and management) Darryl Boyce said bed bug sightings are rare, with this being perhaps the second since the school was founded. He added the school was not made aware of any instances of the bugs on campus.
Boyce urged students to report any further findings of these bugs if they see them. He added university procedure is to alert housing services before pest control is called.
“If she discovered them, she should have professionally reported it,” he said. “However, since bed bugs need food to thrive in a location, a bench in the Loeb building wouldn’t even be able to sustain them.”
“The only cases worth worrying about are in or around where students live,” Boyce added.
Tamblyn-Watts said she believes the problem should be treated as a huge issue, but Boyce said the case is pretty harmless.
Tamblyn-Watts said the benches looked a little dirty, and so might be part of the problem.
“The benches were dirty and it looked like no one had been cleaning it for a long time. Loeb on its own is less frequently travelled, so it seems as if it isn’t cared for often,” she said.
