Bed mites: reasons for their appearance in the house and ways to combat them

Ticks in the house

Several species of dangerous arthropods can live in close proximity to humans:

• Household. The favorite place of arthropods is dust, down pillows and blankets, mattresses, woolen carpets, rugs, and caked clothes. Parasites are represented by two types. One feeds on dead, keratinized particles of human and animal skin, down and bird feathers. The second species is predatory and eats its smaller relatives.
• Forest. They feed on the blood and lymph of humans or domestic animals. They get into homes by accident, on clothes, pet fur, or in bouquets of wildflowers.
• Subcutaneous. The habitat of parasites is the person himself. According to statistics, out of 100 adults, 97 people live with these parasites. The source of nutrition for subcutaneous mites is flakes of dead skin and the contents of hair follicle cells.

Every insect poses a threat to humans. Animals have learned to adapt well, so they are not easy to spot. A forest tick can hide in an apartment for a very long time until an opportunity arises to land on the victim’s body. You can detect an uninvited guest only when it crawls on the skin or has already managed to attach itself.

How to kill bed bugs

There are three main methods to combat this problem: biological, chemical or mechanical. Each of them is effective in its own way. Let's consider each method separately.

Chemical pest control has always been considered the most effective method of controlling bedbugs. The use of an insecticide is a guarantee of getting rid of bedbugs once and for all.

An insecticide is a chemical preparation that is sold in the form of an emulsion, powder or spray. The best and most famous example of such a remedy is dichlorphos. In addition to dichlorvos, you can use Reid, Chlorpyrifos or Riapan.

• Chlorpyrifos. It is diluted in water and applied to all places through which insects can enter the house and their habitats. Before use, it is important to carefully read the instructions so as not to harm the health of the inhabitants of the home.
• Raid. A time-tested remedy for bed mites that gives guaranteed results. The only drawback of the product is the pungent smell. It needs to be sprayed along the baseboards and on problem areas and wait for the result.
• Riapan is no less effective than the above remedies. It is sold in powder form, scattered along the baseboard and under the bed. Riapan should be used with caution; the product is very toxic and can harm your health.

How dangerous are ticks?

Arachnids of this subclass are represented by more than 50 thousand species. Among the representatives there are families that destroy agricultural crops, spread dangerous infectious diseases and are the culprits of allergic reactions.

Household ticks do not feed on blood and do not bite warm-blooded creatures. For humans, they are dangerous due to their presence and vital activity. Doctors say that household mites are the culprits of most allergic reactions and bronchial asthma. Insect feces contain special proteins that are themselves allergens. Upon contact with human skin, a rash and itching may occur. When inhaling pest excrement, problems with the functioning of the upper respiratory tract, angioedema and urticaria may occur.

Subcutaneous mites do not pose a particular threat to a person in good health. If the immune system is weakened, personal hygiene rules are not observed, or after infectious diseases, the activity of arachnids of this species can lead to the appearance of rosacea or rosacea, the development of blepharitis, allergic dermatitis and blepharoconjunctivitis.

Forest guests can be carriers of dangerous infectious diseases, for example:

• Encephalitis;
• Borreliosis;
• Yellow fever.

Some members of the family are carriers of various helminths, the eggs of which could reach them along with the blood of infected animals that served as their source of food before humans.

To understand the danger of the situation, you need to know how long a tick lives in an apartment. Blood-sucking parasites can live for more than eight years waiting for a victim. To avoid bites from dangerous bloodsuckers, during the period of their activity, you should regularly inspect all household members, clothes and pets after each walk in the park or in areas with tall grass.

Precautionary measures

Ticks carry serious diseases; their saliva may contain pathogens of Lyme disease or tick-borne encephalitis. These infections are dangerous to the human body and can be fatal. When spending time in nature, it is better to protect yourself in advance. Such precautions may include:

• light-colored clothing on which the parasite can be noticed in time;
• do not leave any areas of your body exposed, tuck your T-shirt into your pants, wear socks and closed shoes, and it is better to choose a jacket or sweatshirt with a hood;
• while walking, try to avoid tall grass;
• after you arrive home, wash or brush all your clothes well and hang them in a cool place;
• you can use acaricidal repellents, but they do not provide one hundred percent guarantee of protection against ticks;
• At the dacha, make sure that the grass on the lawns is low, and do not leave branches and mowed plants in heaps on the site.

But if you want to relax peacefully, not think about parasites and just enjoy nature, then it makes sense to treat your dacha against ticks. The Biotrix insecticidal service will carry out the treatment, and you will be able to relax and work throughout the summer season without fear of ticks. This event, aimed at destroying parasites, must be done before the start of warm days. Then experts guarantee you safety from ticks in your summer cottage.

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How to fight ticks?

If you have encountered representatives of this class, you must immediately take appropriate measures. House mites, which live in dust and laundry, thrive best in warm, moist environments. You can get rid of parasites through regular ventilation, which will help lower the temperature and relative humidity in the apartment.

Insects die if the air humidity is less than 40%; special dehumidifiers can be used for this. Regular high-quality cleaning with thorough washing of floors, even in hard-to-reach places, will help quickly reduce the pest population. Be sure to clean upholstered furniture, carpets, toys made of textile materials, and it is best to get rid of them altogether.

Ticks that live on the human body choose for themselves those places where there is abundant secretion of sebum. To deprive parasites of a favorable habitat and reproduction, it is necessary to constantly observe the rules of hygiene, use soap and special lotions that inhibit the activity of the sebaceous glands. Many who have heard about subcutaneous parasites do not know whether ticks can live in an apartment, outside the human body.

Insects leave their shelters in search of a partner for mating, at such moments the owner can dry himself with a towel or sleep. The adult remains on the fabric and waits for the next contact with a potential victim. You can only get rid of subcutaneous mites using complex methods, including the use of antibiotic therapy, physiotherapeutic procedures and topical medications.

You can get rid of blood-sucking representatives of the class only by removing them from the surface of the body. To unhook the bloodsucker, special medical devices are used in the form of a handle with a loop, hooks, and tweezers. If there are no auxiliary tools at hand, a regular thread or any tweezers will do. The insect is grabbed closer to the head and pulled out with gentle twisting movements. After the parasite is removed, it is placed in a container to be transported to the research laboratory, and the bite site is treated with an antiseptic. Forest ticks can be potential carriers of encephalitis, so after its removal you should definitely visit a doctor. It is strictly forbidden to crush a tick, as this increases the chance of infection. To exclude a possible infectious infection, it is necessary to take blood tests 10 and 21 days after the bite.

What is the life expectancy of ticks

How many years does a tick live? This depends mainly on climatic conditions, temperature and humidity. These arachnids are highly resilient and can live even 10-12 years. If the habitat is unfavorable, they fall into a state of suspended animation. Hibernation continues until the tick has the opportunity to attack its victim again. On average, parasites live three years. Can ticks live on clothes? Of course they can, but for a very, very short time. They need high humidity and therefore, when the parasite gets on your outfit, it immediately looks for a path to a place where it can attach itself. Therefore, the myth that ticks live on clothes for weeks is really just a myth. How long does the parasite spend on a person? After a bite, ticks remain on the body from a couple of days to two weeks. Having dug into the skin, they feed on blood, and when satisfied, they fall off. In a situation where nothing prevents the tick from calmly sucking blood, it can increase in size up to 120 times, thus stocking up on nutrients.

Should I submit a tick for analysis?

Modern research answers this question in the negative, since the percentage of detection of infectious agents in ticks has virtually no effect on the risk of human disease, but only increases uncertainty and creates unnecessary anxiety.

Therefore, as the famous pediatrician blogger Roman Shiyan said, “it is more reasonable to examine not a tick, but a person if he is suspected of having a corresponding disease.”

Folk remedies for getting rid of insects

Traditional methods can also help in the fight against parasites, but only if there are not many bedbugs. It is better to remove a large number of insects in another way; traditional methods are ineffective here.

How to get rid of bed mites at home:

1. Remove nests with a vacuum cleaner, or press with a slipper. Mechanical influence is one of the most effective folk methods of influence.
2. Apply temperatures to them. In severe frost or hot weather, furniture and mattresses are taken outside and knocked out. You can scald the infected area with boiling water.
3. Products with a strong odor (kerosene, vinegar, naphthalene, denatured alcohol, etc.) can also help. They need to be applied to the surface: baseboards, corners of furniture, etc.
4. The smell of wormwood and tansy is also unpleasant for insects. They need to be placed on the floor; the smell will repel parasites.

Find out also: what parasites will Bactefort drops help you get rid of, how to use them, and where to buy them?

Find out more about how you can completely get rid of nail fungus here.

Instructions for using Naksodzhin tablets: https://moninomama.ru/fungus/treat/naksodzhin-kak-primenyat.html.

First aid kit items

You can make your own anti-parasite chemicals. For this, everything you need can be found in the first aid kit:

1. Camphor and turpentine. In one container mix 100 ml of ethyl alcohol and turpentine and 5 g of camphor. The resulting mixture is used to treat bedbug nests.
2. Ammonia . The pungent odor of this product is intolerable to bedbugs. To do this, you need to mix 150 g of denatured alcohol, 10 g of ammonia and 4 g of benzene. The product is poured onto a saucer and placed near the infected areas.
3. Denatured alcohol. Insects and nests should be watered with pure denatured alcohol.
4. Another effective mixture consists of 100 ml cresol, 200 ml kerosene and 10 naphthalene . Problem areas are treated with the resulting mixture using a brush.

Vaccination against tick-borne encephalitis

Most often, people who encounter an infected tick develop tick-borne encephalitis. Lyme disease and other infections are reported less frequently. To prevent the disease, you can get vaccinated in advance. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends vaccination against tick-borne encephalitis for adults and children over 1 year of age. To whom this is especially important:

• residents of endemic (natural foci for the spread of ticks) regions and localities;
• vacationers in rural areas;
• people traveling on holiday to endemic areas.

Vaccination takes place according to a certain scheme. First, the first vaccination is given, after 1-3 months - the second, and after another 12 months - the third. Revaccination is necessary every 3 years. Immune protection against encephalitis begins to work after the second dose. The third dose forms long-term immunity. It is necessary to strictly monitor the deadlines; violation of them prevents the development of a full-fledged immune response.

Vaccination can be carried out at any time of the year, but the most reasonable solution would be to calculate the timing so that by April, i.e. By the beginning of the active season, immunity has already begun to form.

The following side effects are possible after the vaccine is administered:

• swelling and redness in the injection area;
• headache;
• skin rash;
• slight rise in temperature.

Unpleasant symptoms can be relieved with antipyretic drugs. Vaccination is contraindicated during pregnancy, infectious and cold diseases, and a tendency to severe allergic reactions.

Danger to humans

Every person fears that bed parasites will bite him and cause an infection. But not in the case of bed mites. They are not capable of biting. Their danger lies elsewhere. Eating intensely and actively reproducing, they leave behind waste products:

• shells after molting;
• feces containing the allergen.

Tick ​​allergens contain digestive enzymes and are found in feces. They are microscopic balls that rise along with the dust during cleaning. When inhaled, these particles enter the human respiratory tract, quickly dissolve there and release the allergen.

A high content of these active substances in the body can provoke:

• allergic rhinitis;
• bronchial asthma;
• respiratory allergies;
• atopic dermatitis;
• conjunctivitis;
• rhinoconjunctivitis;
• Quincke's edema.

Such undesirable symptoms may appear in people who are predisposed to allergic reactions. Therefore, before taking antiallergic medications, you need to thoroughly clean your living space. If symptoms persist even in a clean room, you should contact an allergist and find out the cause of the attacks.

Allergy

Features of the biology of dust mites: what they eat and where they are most often found in the apartment

It belongs to the species Dermatophagoides pteronyssnus. Apartment parasites belong to the pyroglyphid family. They are joined by the granary species, that is, parasites living among food products. The second type includes predatory mites that feed on insects of the first group. There is also a third species - individuals that accidentally fall into dust, but do not reproduce in it. Only parasites of the first group - pyroglyphid mites - pose a danger to humans.

To identify a parasite, you need to know what it looks like. Ticks are microscopic animals, reaching a size of 0.1-0.5 mm. They look like small spiders, flattened, have a body consisting of separate fragments connected to each other. The microorganism moves with the help of four pairs of legs with suction cups. Thanks to them, ticks hold tightly and run quickly. There are two pairs of jaws on the head, with which they grind plates of dead skin. The body is covered with a water-repellent coating. The life cycle is 80 days. During this period, the individual leaves 60 eggs, from which offspring appear. They live in colonies. Doctors highlight the danger of the presence of ticks, expressed in the degree of infestation:

• 1st – less than 100 individuals per 1 gram of dust are safe for humans;
• 2nd – up to 500 pieces per 1g of dust can cause an asthma attack;
• 3rd – from 1000 to 2000 mites in 1g of dust causes allergies and chronic rhinitis.

Such manifestations do not occur in all people who have ticks at home. Reactions occur in individuals with a genetic predisposition to allergies.

This type of parasite is also called bed parasites, since their favorite habitat is the host’s bed, because they feed on dead epithelial cells. An adult can “rub” up to 1 gram of skin per week, which makes it possible for an entire army of mites to feed. Moreover, men “lose” their skin more actively than women. They have it rough, rough, in contrast to the delicate women's or children's.

Places of parasite settlement

In addition, you can find them in:

• carpeting;
• upholstered furniture;
• dust bag of a vacuum cleaner;
• soft toys;
• feather pillows;
• old mattress;
• duvet;
• sofa;
• bed linen;
• curtains;
• old books and clothes;
• woolen things.

Advice! If you look for ticks indoors, the largest number of them are found in the bed.

A tick has attached itself - what to do?

If you find a tick attached to you, then there are several options on what to do: you can go to the nearest emergency room, hospital or clinic , where they will help you, or you can remove it yourself (this saves time).

How to do it:

• Using a special device (sold in pharmacies and hardware stores).
• Using thin tweezers: you need to grab the tick as close to the skin as possible and confidently pull up (you can slightly rotate the tweezers around its axis).
• Using a thin strong thread , which is pulled into a knot as close to the skin as possible and, turning around a vertical axis, the tick is removed (option for advanced ones).

Ideally, you need to remove the entire tick from the body without damaging it: if you remove it carelessly, you can squeeze out pathogens from it. For the same reason, you should not touch the tick’s abdomen.

Important: the option of applying vegetable oil to the tick to block its breathing and force it to let go of the person does not work - the tick will not fall off, but, choking, may vomit infected blood into the wound.