No matter how fanatical you may be about hygiene it is unlikely you, or more especially your children, will completely escape becoming infected by head lice at some stage or other.
If it happens you can cringe and feel disgusted.
The truth is though, these parasites actually prefer clean hair as it easier for them to move around.
Once you become better acquainted with the facts you will understand why.
What are Head Lice? They are parasitic insects that infect and live on the human scalp.
The adults are about 1 to 3mm in size, something similar to a sesame seed.
Their colour is pale grey turning to rusty brown after they have ingested blood.
They are wingless and cannot fly, leap or swim.
They have six legs with claws that are employed to clamp onto hair shafts and to assist them clambering around.
Their Life Cycle An adult louse lays up to six eggs per day, some 50 to 100 within its lifetime.
Each egg is glued to a hair strand no more than half an inch from the scalp.
It will then take around 7 to 10 days for the eggs to incubate and hatch.
Due to the closeness of the host scalp it provides heat and easy access to a feeding site.
This is essential because the newly emerged hatchling begins feeding almost straight away.
Newly hatched lice are known as nymphs.
They will shed their skin three times as they grow to become adults in a process that takes some 9 to 12 days.
They are then mature enough to mate and spread the infestation.
These parasites only ever infest humans and never pets or other animals and cannot survive more than two days away from a host.
Symptoms Probably the main symptoms you are likely to spot is a child constantly scratching their scalp.
The bug bites the scalp and inserts its proboscis, a tube rather like a drinking straw.
While drawing up host blood the parasite injects anti-coagulant to combat blood clotting.
This all works very similarly to mosquito bites.
The difference is lice do not carry disease.
If infected, what seems like dandruff could be nits, the empty eggs cases, moulted skins of nymphs or dead adults that have fallen from the hair.
Inspecting The Hair.
Short hair is obviously easier to deal with but whatever the length, a methodical approach is best.
Use a good light source because these critters are tiny.
Carefully go through small sections of hair at a time, paying very close attention.
Don't rush this or you will miss them.
Be aware, they have survival instincts and will try to scuttle away to hide deeper in the hair.
Eliminating Hair Lice Firstly you cannot simply wash them out because as stated, they have claws that grip tightly onto hairs.
Their eggs are similarly tough to remove by being glued in place.
While you can individually pick them out or drag the eggs off with your fingers, it is a seriously tedious way to do it.
A far quicker and much more successful solution is to use a proper nit comb.
These tools are specifically made for the job.
They have have teeth or tines which are close enough together to capture adults and draw eggs off hairs.
The next step is to thoroughly wash the hair in a dedicated shampoo from your pharmacist.
Forget the crazy old wife's tales of mayonnaise or vinegar because they are not designed for the job.
Recheck the hair on a regualr weekly basis and the problem will soon be solved.
Stopping Re-infestation Head lice are spread by human contact, hair to hair or by wearing something they have contaminated with their presence.
Try to ask your kids not to swap hats, scarves, coats etc with friends.
If you have been infested wash hats etc, bedclothes, pillowcases at a high temperature and tumble dry on high heat if possible.
Give material furniture like sofas a thorough vacuum to eliminate lurking critters and wash cushion covers.
Invest in a good quality nit comb, ideally an electronic one as they not only bleep to let you know bugs are detected and present, but will zap an kill the little monsters.