They invaded Toronto just before the recent Toronto Film Festival opened.
Not, not paparazzi, or giant mutated zombie movie spiders. Something even worse. Bedbugs.
Toronto may be one of the cleanest cities in North America, but it’s about to host a first, a Bedbug Summit, the Toronto Star reports.
“Are bedbugs the new Justin Bieber?” the Star says one Twitterer recently asked. That’s not a very nice thing to say about the Canadian pop star, but both Bieber and bedbugs have become ubiquitous in the media recently.
This Sept. 29 summit on the little pests is different: It’s actually a government hearing, the brainchild of a Liberal Member of Parliament, Mike Colle. It will feature government health officials, entomologists, tenant and landlord groups.
That’s because Colle has introduced a bill that would require landlords to provide tenants with a “bedbug information report” before signing a lease. Another Member’s bill would require that landlords be licensed — and that they not be renewed if their units have bedbugs.
The Toronto Public Health Department says it’s received an increase in bedbug reporting calls this year.
Bugs dancing in the dark
“This is something that’s ruining people’s lives,” says Colle, “and the technicalities of it, whether it’s an infectious disease or not, is not relevant to people who can’t sleep, work, and are stressed out beyond belief.
“I just wish people would stop looking at it as a stigma for a city, or for anybody to talk about it.”
Colle adds: “That’s why these things have proliferated. Because we’ve kept them, basically, in the dark.”
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