Chicago Named The #1 City In The U.S....For Bedbugs

By Mae Rice in News on Jan 14, 2016 6:37PM

Dead bed bugs on a paper towel (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

For the fourth year running, Chicago has come in at #1 on a list of the Top 50 Bedbug Cities. That means that a national pest-control company, Orkin, verified and treated more cases of bedbugs in Chicago than it did anywhere else.

The Midwest also beat out every other region of the country. Fourteen Midwestern cities—more than from any other region—made the list, including multiple cities in Illinois, Ohio, Michigan and Kentucky.

Here’s the full top ten:

1. Chicago
2. Los Angeles
3. Washington, D.C.
4. New York
5. Columbus, Ohio
6. Philadelphia
7. Detroit
8. Cincinnati
9. Richmond-Petersburg, Va.
10. Baltimore

You can see the full top 50 here.

Chicago’s place on this list is upsetting—especially because New York, which has millions more people than us, rose 14 spots in the rankings this year and still didn’t beat us.

However, we choose to believe that New York has so many companies that treat bedbugs, Orkin only sees a tiny fraction of the city’s cases. Isn’t that a nice, relaxing thing to think, even though it’s based on no real evidence?

If you prefer to arm yourself with information about bedbugs, rather than a baseless rumor we made up, the city has a bedbug fact sheet.