In short
It is possible but uncommon. Bed bugs can be carried onto fabric seats in bags and clothes, and occasionally get carried off again by someone else. The risk on a short commute is low. Overnight sleepers, long journeys and luggage racks carry more, and a quick check of your bag and coat when you get home deals with most of it.
Contents
Every so often a video of a bed bug on a train or bus seat goes round social media, and people start eyeing the upholstery on the way to work. So how big is the risk?
How bed bugs end up on public transport
Bed bugs do not live on trains or buses the way they live in a bedroom. They need somewhere to hide close to a sleeping person, and a regular meal. A seat on a busy commuter train offers neither for long.
What does happen is that bugs get carried on. Someone with an infestation at home sits down with a bag, a coat or a rucksack that has a bug or two on it. A bug drops into the seat seam. Later, someone else’s bag or coat picks it up and takes it home. That is the whole route, and it depends on a chain of chances.
Which journeys carry more risk
The risk goes up with three things: fabric, time and sleep.
- Fabric seats have seams and gaps that a bed bug can hide in. Hard plastic seats do not.
- Long journeys give a bug more time to find you or your belongings.
- Sleeping, on an overnight train or a long coach, is when bed bugs are most likely to come out and feed.
So a short hop on the Subway or a bus across the city is very low risk. An overnight sleeper or a long coach journey with bags under the seat is a little higher. Luggage racks where many cases sit together are another place bugs can move between bags.
What to do when you get home
You do not need to strip off at the door. A few simple habits cover it:
- Keep bags off the bed. Put bags and cases on a hard floor or a hard chair, not on the bed or the sofa.
- Look at your bag after long journeys. Check seams, zips and pockets in good light. You are looking for a flat brown insect, small dark spots or pale skins.
- Wash and dry travel clothes hot after an overnight trip if you are worried: 60°C and at least 30 minutes in a hot dryer, as the NHS advises for bedding and clothes.
- Watch for signs in the next few weeks. Bites alone are not proof, but spots on the sheet or along the mattress seams are worth acting on early.
If you think you have brought them home
Do not panic, and do not reach for a fogger. Shop sprays and foggers tend to scatter bed bugs into other rooms and, in a tenement or block, into the flat next door. NHS advice is that bed bugs are difficult to clear without professional help, and that a pest control service is the way to deal with them.
What helps is acting early. One or two bugs that came home in a bag are a small problem. A few months later, with eggs hatching every week, they are a big one. An inspection will tell you whether there is anything there at all, and how far it has gone.
Should transport operators do more?
Operators clean and inspect their fleets, and where a seat is reported they can take it out of service and treat it. If you see what you think is a bed bug, report it to the operator with the date, time, route and seat or carriage. A photo helps.
Keeping it in proportion
Most bed bug infestations in homes come from travel and overnight stays, second-hand furniture, and neighbouring flats, not from a seat on a commuter train. Hotels, hostels and staying with friends whose homes have bed bugs are much more common routes, because that is where people sleep. It is worth checking a hotel bed before you unpack, and keeping your case on the luggage rack rather than the floor or the bed.
If you are in Glasgow and need help, our bed bug treatment in Glasgow page sets out what to do first and what treatment usually costs.