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After a long day of traveling to your destination, there's nothing we love to do more than flop ourselves onto the bed and scroll through the TV channels before a well-deserved snooze.
But, experts are warning us to hold off on doing just that as it could lead to one big mistake we end up paying for.
Experts are pleading with travelers to heed their warning and, despite how tempting it might be to just snuggle into bed after a long day, a quick and easy bed bug check could save days and even months of further stress.
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We've all seen those TV shows like Gordon Ramsay's Hotel Hell where he attempts to fix every element of a bad hotel, but there is actually a quick and easy way to tell whether your hotel room has an infestation of the unwanted bunkmates.
HuffPost Senior Editor Caroline Bologna, who spoke about the subject on HuffPost’s “Am I Doing It Wrong?” podcast, co-hosted by Raj Punjabi and Noah Michelson, said: "I have two really good friends who have gotten bed bugs in New York [hotels] before,
“It doesn’t matter how nice the hotel is ― they’re not attracted to grime.”
It's true. Despite what we might think, an infestation of bedbugs doesn't always mean the place is super dirty. They could have been introduced by other travellers who had them on their cases or clothes.
The NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene says that bedbugs are 'about the size of an apple seed', and are 'big enough to be easily seen, but often hide in cracks in furniture, floors, or walls.'
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But surely not your room, right? Well, you'd be surprised.
According to a study by pest control company Orkin, eight in 10 hotels had bed bug problems in just one year. Yikes.
The pesky critters have even caused widespread concern in France, having disrupted Paris Fashion Week last year.
Fortunately, avoiding the little suckers takes little to no time at all. Just give your hotel room a thirty second sweep before settling in for the night.
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“They like upholstery — just look at the sheets,” said Bologna.
“Just peel back one of the corners of the bed, look at the seams of the mattress… just check. Check anything upholstered. Look at the headboard. Look at the chairs. If you don’t see anything, you’re probably totally fine.”
If you're extra weary of bedbugs, you can put your suitcase in the bathtub or on a wooden surface such as a desk to avoid coming into contact with them.
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“Most hotel rooms are carpeted, so just don’t have your bag on carpeting,” said Bologna
Should you have the shock of finding these uninvited guests in your room, tell the hotel's management team immediately and they should swiftly move you into a new room and deal with the issue. However, Bologna warns not to take the room next door if you can help it.
“If you decide you don’t want to leave the hotel but you want to switch rooms, don’t move to an adjacent room because that would be likely to have the same problem,” she said.
Topics: Travel, World News, US News, Animals