Chicago the Worst City for Bed Bugs

Chicago has moved to the top spot of a list no city wants to be a part of: the most treatments for bed bug infestations.

Pest control company Orkin said Tuesday it did more business in Chicago than any other city last year. Chicago had been second on the list in 2011 behind Cincinnati.

Overall, Orkin's parent company Rollins, which runs eight pest control brands, said it saw its bed bug business jump by 33 percent last year compared with the year before.

Chicago in 2012 was ranked just ahead of Detroit, Los Angeles and Denver in terms of exterminations by Orkin. Perhaps surprisingly, the nation's largest city, New York, only ranked 10th on the list.

Cleanliness is not a factor in bed bug infestations, but the creatures are drawn to clutter. They can hide in a number of places in a home, including mattress seams, picture frames and electrical outlets. About the size of an apple seed when fully grown and fed, they can be tricky to spot.

Signs of an infestation include rust-colored stains on sheets or other surfaces on or around a bed and a sweet musty odor, according to the CDC. The bugs tend to spread quickly because they inject an anesthetic when they bite, which prevents a person from realizing that they've been bitten.