Have your exterminator treat the apartment and inspect all the apartment around it, upstairs, next door. They will spread like wild fire if you don't act right away!

I am of the opinion that you should not inform the entire building as it is not a life or death situation. Deal with the problem by having a top class extermination company addresss the situation right away. The question I would ask myself in a situation like this is, Al (if it were your apartment would you like the whole building and beyond knowing that you had bed bugs)

Hope this helps

FN

My mother knew then well as it was a major problem prior to the war years. As a child of the '50, I did not have to contend with them thanks to DDT, which is no longer in used as a pesticide and probably banned, except for state emergency situations. Old box strings and mattresses were fastidiously washed with muriatic acid or exposed to the sun. However, she always commented the following;

1. Bedbugs traveled in clothing left over an infested areas. Therefore, if you were to go to people's houses, you did not sit (as a young person) in a friend's bed or left a coat on a bed, but expected to be hung.

2. Cane furniture (old trolley car seats) was a good source of bedbug infestation. Passengers got bedbugs from these sitting areas, which were brought home and other places.

I don't think that bedbugs will invade other residents unless the resident brings it out by way of sitting in lobby furniture, through laundry or even newspapers and magazines disposed thorugh compactors.

Nonetheless, the co-op should offer exterminating services and try to clear the focus of investation to avoid bedbugs in laundry rooms or even lobby furniture if the resident with the infested furniture and bed happens to use such facilites. You may charge the owner of the apartment or decide, for the benefit of all to absorb the cost.

AdC

I hate to inform you of this but bed bugs can invade other apartments, they climb the walls and go through and underneath walls to other apartments. If a apartment has them and they don't treat the area right away, the problem gets worse. They should have the apartment sprayed and insert tracking powder inside of the electrical outlets to reach inside of the walls. (It does work).

You are right about the DDT chemical, but there are other chemicals out there the exterminator uses.

Good Luck.

the following is from the NY Times (archive) Bedbugs have raised a thicket a questions for tenants, landlords and homeowners. Some renters have gone to court to compel their landlords to exterminate the pests. Co-op and condo owners are typically responsible for infestations in their apartments. And bedbugs can move easily from one apartment to another. Getting rid of them can be extremely difficult.

Michael F. Potter, an urban entomologist at the University of Kentucky and an authority on bedbugs, said they were poised to join the ranks of cockroaches and rats as the pre-eminent household pests in the country. “This is one serious issue,” he said. “This will be the pest of the 21st century — no question about it.”

read the rest here: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/15/realestate/15cov.html?ex=1181880000&en=be07411999c5008a&ei=5070

Regardless of responsibility, no one wants an epidemic and the Coop should move to remedy any situation ASAP.

good luck

~AR

Just saw this in the new Cooperator online

http://cooperator.com/articles/1430/1/Domestic-Terrorists/Page1.html

I think that the board of a coop has a duty to warn the other shareholders as this type of problem has a financial impact on a coop's value and the board has liability to protect the coop. If they are not warning residents, they are part of the problem as there are many routes that the bedbugs can travel throughout.