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Integrated bed bug control strategies necessary to fight insecticide resistance
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Some types of bed bugs showed signs of resistance when exposed to the common insecticides chlorfenapyr and bifenthrin, suggesting that these chemical methods should be combined with other, nonchemical approaches to provide long-term efficacy, according to recent findings.
“In the past, bed bugs have repeatedly shown the ability to develop resistance to products overly relied upon for their control,” Ameya D. Gondhalekar, PhD, research assistant at Purdue University’s Center for Urban and Industrial Pest Management, said in the press release. “The findings of the current study also show similar trends in regard to chlorfenapyr and bifenthrin resistance development in bed bugs.”
Prior research shows that the common bed bug, Cimex lectularius, is significantly resistant to certain types of pyrethroid-class insecticides; however, its susceptibility to chlorfenapyr, a pyrethroid-class insecticide, and bifenthrin, a pyrrole-class insecticide, remains unclear. Researchers therefore tested 10 populations of bed bugs collected from Indiana, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and Washington D.C. to measure the percent of bed bugs eliminated within 7 days of chlorfenapyr and bifenthrin exposure.
Gondhalekar and colleagues compared glass vial with filter paper bioassay methods for their utility in susceptibility monitoring. Using statistical analysis, they considered the populations in which more than 25% of the bed bugs survived to have reduced susceptibility to the insecticide.
Study results showed bed bugs were susceptible to certain products that contained chlorfenapyr and bifenthrin. Control mortality averaged to 10% for chlorfenapyr and 2.5% for bifenthrin assays. Gonfhalekar and colleagues found that the glass vial assay was better for susceptibility monitoring with chlorfenapyr. Linear regression analysis of average percent mortality data in vial assays showed a significant correlation between the susceptibility status of bed bug field strains to both insecticides (P = .03). The researchers detected reduced susceptibility in three field strains to chlorfenapyr and in five strains to bifenthrin, suggesting that certain populations of bed bugs may be segregating toward greater chlorfenapyr and bifenthrin resistance.
“With these findings in mind and from an insecticide resistance management perspective, both bifenthrin and chlorfenpyr should be integrated with other methods used for bed bug elimination in order to preserve their efficacy long-term,” Gondhalekar said in the release. “There is a plethora of research that has shown that if insecticides are integrated with additional control measures such as vacuuming, steam or heat, mattress encasements, traps and desiccant dusts, effective bed bug control can be accomplished and theoretically this should reduce the risk of resistance build-up in populations.” – by Savannah Demko
Disclosure: Gondhalekar reports this research is partially supported by a United States Department of Housing and Urban Development grant. Please see the full study for a complete list of all other authors’ relevant financial disclosures.
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