Michael Fritz and Marcos Miranda, residents of University Village, have been dealing with a bed bug outbreak that began the week of Jan. 4 and continues to be a problem.

When Fritz arrived back to Chico on Jan. 4, Miranda had his mattress turned on its side and was wiping dead bugs off his bed with a paper towel.

“There were bugs in his mattress and he showed me all of his bug bites; They had been biting him in his sleep,” said Fritz.

Miranda went to the office and let them know about the situation. He was advised to put in a work order to deal with the problem and two people from University Housing and Food Services came to look at the bugs.

The residents let them look at the mattress and also showed them a couple of the bugs they had found. They claimed the bugs in the mattresses were too big to be bed bugs. They took the mattress cover and one of the dead bugs on a paper towel and said they would discuss what to do next.

Shortly before school started, Miranda let Fritz know that he would be moving out because the problem still had not been addressed and fixed.

Fritz had gone to San Diego and when he came back he assumed the problem had been solved by that time. Pest Control had come out to take a look as well, but the issue still remained.

This week, Fritz has put in another work order and pest control is supposed to show up tomorrow for a bed bug treatment, which will hopefully fix the issue for good.

“Bed bugs are a real problem and can spread easily if they get on your clothes. From what I’ve read about them, you have to clean every single thing you own to get rid of them,” said Fritz.

Hannah Suzuki can be reached at [email protected] or @theorion_news on Twitter.