There’s a lot to think about when setting off on a vacation. From remembering your passport and travel documents to packing enough underwear, the checklist is already pretty endless. However, there’s one more key thing we want you to add to the list of must-dos before settling into relaxation mode: checking your hotel or home rental for bed bugs. Luckily, according to one flight attendant, there’s a super easy way to do just that.
In November, Hannah, a cabin crew member from Chicago, shared her quick hack on TikTok, which she says she does in “every hotel room” she checks into to ensure it’s bed bug-free. And that’s simply breathing all over her hotel bed.
“Bedbugs are attracted to your carbon dioxide that you breathe out,” she explained in her quick hack video alongside her uncle, who is also a longtime flight attendant. “So, I flip up the corners [of the hotel or home’s mattress] and start [breathing] on the bed.”
Her hot tip is backed by plenty of science, including a Rutgers University study that found CO2 to be an “effective alternative to conventional fumigants for eliminating bedbugs hiding in infested household items such as clothing, shoes, books, electronics, sofas, and so forth.”
Another 2012 study from Oxford found that exposing bed bugs to high concentrations of carbon dioxide can effectively kill them at all life stages. However, it did also note that you likely need to expose the bed bugs to 100 percent CO2 for about 24 hours for it to be effective.
There are other ways to both check for bedbugs and mitigate your risk, including placing your luggage in an unexpected place when you arrive at a hotel: the bathroom.
“Whenever I check into a hotel, I immediately put my luggage either in the bathroom, the entryway, or any space away from the bed and not on the carpet,” Lydia Mansel, a Travel + Leisure contributor and travel Just Packed founder previously shared with T+L. “This way, my belongings are far enough away from any furniture where bed bugs usually reside—and I significantly lower my chances of bringing them home.”
Mansel added that it’s also key to leave a little note on your luggage if you try this trick, as hotel housekeeping may think you put it there by mistake.
Then, it’s time to check over your room—and that starts with the bed. Go ahead and pull off that freshly made bedding, including the fitted sheet, to check the box spring and mattress for signs of bed bugs, which can come in the form of dark stains, shells, eggs, and tiny creepy crawlers. Then, examine pillows, behind the headboard, the room’s upholstered furniture, and in dresser drawer joints and dark spaces.
It may sound like overkill, but trust us—because we’ve been there—you’d rather search the room for three minutes than spend days dealing with bed bugs on your return.
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