As we at CityMetric know all too well, bed bugs are not pleasant creatures. They bite, they itch, and they spread indiscriminately to clothes, luggage, and even books. Worst of all, once they get into your house, it’s remarkably difficult to get rid of them again.

Lately, they’ve strayed even further afield. On 31 August, the New York Daily News reported that, since the beginning of that month, there had been 21 sightings of the insects on New York’s subways. Joe Costales, chairman of the local Transport Workers Union, told the paper that there have been occasional sightings in transit workers’ lodgings before, but now “it’s throughout the system”.

These stats didn’t come from the Metropolitan Transit Authority itself: the News got them from unnamed “transit sources”. They’ve also responded somewhat tersely to the news. Spokesman Adam Lisberg said:

“More than 5.8 million people ride 8,000 subway trains on an average weekday, but the MTA has found no bedbug infestations on any trains, and has found and treated bedbugs on only 16 trains.”

He did, however, add that a “specialist expert” has been called in to review the situation.

If you plan to take your chances and continue to ride the bug-infested trains, here’s a quick breakdown of where the bugs have been spotted on individual lines (three sightings were in MTA crew rooms, so we haven’t included them here):

Might be a good idea to avoid the N line for a while.