Bedbugs blitz N.Y. buildings

NEW YORK — Sleep tight, New York.

The city has been infested with bedbugs, and the bloodsucking night crawlers aren't discriminating between swank high-rises and low-income tenements, the Daily News found.

"It's the best-kept secret in New York," said Andy Linares, owner of Bug Off Pest Control Center in Washington Heights.

A decade ago, Linares would see one or two bedbug cases a week, and only in decrepit buildings.

Now he sees about 20 — and they're everywhere.

"I'm repulsed, I'm horrified and I'm disgusted," said a mother of three, who lives in an upscale building in Queens, N.Y., where the beasties have spread to 26 apartments.

Nationwide, there was a 19 percent increase in bedbug complaints during an 18-month stretch from summer 2003 to winter 2004, according to a March survey by Pest Control Technology magazine.

While there is no official tally of bedbug complaints in New York City, pest control experts and scientists say the city is in the midst of a serious outbreak.

Tom Nimetz, who has run Better Pest Control Management in Brooklyn for 35 years, said he has been called to more than 500 bedbug jobs in the past two years, up from one or two cases in a year.

The small, flat, wingless pests are about the size of an apple seed and come out of hiding at night to seek out a warm body. They feed for five to 10 minutes, then crawl to a crevice for several days to digest the meal.

The only way to know about an infestation are the telltale red, itchy welts on your skin in the morning.

Once a common problem, bedbugs almost disappeared after World War II, when heavy-duty pesticides such as DDT were put into wider use. But the insecticides are now being used less because they cause environmental damage.

Unlike other bugs, bedbugs are proliferating in Europe and the Middle East and can easily hitch a ride here in travelers' luggage and clothing, said Cornell University entomologist Jody Gagloff-Kauffman, who said complaints about the nasty biters are increasing in hotels and residential buildings.

The city Health Department has noticed the resurgence but isn't set up to combat the bugs — especially because they do not transmit disease and do not pose an imminent health hazard, said one department source.

"We're only starting to discuss what needs to be done. Who handles it? That's the question," the source said.