For years, bleach has been a product of choice for sanitizing and cleaning for most people. Due to its corrosive nature, homeowners have often considered it to kill bed bugs.
- Does Bleach Kill Bed Bugs? Well in summary, Technically, bleach will kill bed bugs by making the sodium hypochlorite oxidize the bug’s body or outer shell.
- Yet, humans or pets could inhale their toxic fumes, or it might damage your clothes and fabrics. Also, it would help if you sprayed the bleach mixture directly on the bed bug.
Just like cockroaches, bed bugs are challenging to control and will multiply fast. Bed bug sprays would be a more effective and faster alternative.
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Does Bleach Kill Bed Bugs? and Their Eggs
According to Michigan’s research, Hsp33 (a protein) tends to react with bleach and thus killed the bacteria under test.
- Therefore, a similar reaction with bleach would also kill bed bugs.
Bleach (with chlorine as its active ingredient) is a chemical compound used in most homes to color-lighten and whiten fabrics and clothes.
As noted above, the chemical application is mainly as a disinfectant or cleaner. It’s primarily loved for its remarkable ability to kill various algae, mildews, and bacteria.
- Its primary function – bleaching- happens through chlorine-initiated reduction or oxidation.
- Chemically, scientists say that Chlorine breaks down chromophore, making the compound non-reactive to all visible light.
Also, bleach can will disinfectant against various microbes through denaturing the bacterial proteins and hence rendering them harmless when they clump together – the same way you cannot uncook a boiled or fried egg.
Why bleach isn’t useful for bed bugs
Do away with bleach (Sodium hypochlorite – NaOCl) and consider safer and practical solutions like rubbing alcohol, Lysol, Ammonia, bed bug steamers, and Kill adult bed bugs and baby bed bug nymphs.
- Below, I’ve outlined the reasons why you should avoid bleach as a bed bug control solution.
Always ensure you carefully read the product label instructions.
1. Requires direct contact with bed bugs
Bleach will only kill bed bugs through direct contact and be less effective for the bugs that are still in some of their odd hiding places.
- Bleach cannot poison bed bugs that fall near it.
- Therefore, the homeowner would require to spray the chemical directly on the bed bug body – if not, you’ll have missed the train.
Therefore, if the bed bugs will be hiding in fabrics and clothes, you might unintentionally damage them.
2. Bleach can poison pets and humans
Bleach may also poison your pets, adult human beings, and kids. But how? If your kids or dogs/ cars accidentally ingest the bleaching liquid, they might get poisoned.
When used in combination with HCl, bleach may result in several conditions such as acute lung injury (ALI), adult respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), or death.
- This may come in the form of chloramine or chlorine dioxide.
Also, bleach may react with human skin leading to chemical burns.
3. bed bug’s pheromones sense bleach from far
These C. hemipterus bugs use their pheromones to determine the type and concentration of chemicals or poisons in their environment and thus can escape if you’ve sprayed any bleach.
Therefore, after detecting some bleach in their environment, they’ll run into hiding cabinets, dresses, cracks, and crevices.
C. hemipterus were previously considered odorless, but various chemical compounds can signal to them and are described like alarm pheromones.
Therefore, bleach will not be a great bed bug control solution since the bugs will detect the chemical and go into hiding.
4. Heat treatment is a better alternative
For this, you’ll do over 2 hours of heat treatment of your rooms at 140 degrees F. Such a treatment will allow you to kill visible bed bugs and those hiding inside cracks and crevices.
- Luckily, this heat treatment method even kills insecticide-resistant bed bugs.
- Heat treatment for bed bugs is Eco-friendly, produces no toxic gases, and will leave no residual like the bleach method we discussed above.
Equally, with this method, you’d not mainly require to undertake follow-up treatments as the technique will kill even the bed bug nymphs and eggs.
Conclusion
So, Does Bleach Kill Bed Bugs? Yes, but how effective?
- Well, we’ve covered reasons why you definitely shouldn’t use bleach to try and kill bed bugs.
Therefore, my conclusion is that you must avoid bleach and result in other roach solutions options such as heat treatment, roach bombs, or roach killers.