For some unlucky Shelton Hall residents, sleep may not be so tight given the possibility that the bedbugs have bitten.

Last week, two residents reported a bedbug infestation after a roommate captured one of the pests in a jar. The day before, a neighbor had revealed strange marks on his skin.

But Boston University has not confirmed the apparent outbreak. It has called the appropriate exterminators and will spray the contaminated rooms, but it should also inform other Shelton Residents — if not all students — about the risk of bedbugs.

Administrators are trying to prevent mass panic, and it makes sense for them to want to dampen the scare.

But officials told residents in the pest-inhabited rooms to not tell anyone that bedbugs were crawling in their mattresses.

The university must know students talk. No one would keep this secret, and the residents certainly did not — one already admitted to divulging information.

When neighbors learn of the infestation from their peers, the fear will be as rampant as the bedbugs themselves, and the backlash will be worse than if the university issued a statement in the first place. It will make students ask why school leaders did not want them to know, allowing for negative speculation.

Students have every right to know bedbugs may be burrowing in sheets around campus — especially those who live in Shelton.

Proper extermination procedure is to spray the rooms directly above and directly below the contaminated space because of the way bedbugs lay eggs. Some Shelton dwellers may be directly affected if they too have to pack up their belongings to prepare for spraying.

And the critters could put the entire BU community at risk. If the insects attach to clothing and other fabrics, they can be transported easily by unsuspecting students going to class. Students should be warned that this is a possibility.

If this isn’t a case of bedbugs, or if it is only an isolated incident, then the university can tell students so when leaders obtain all the facts.

But it is better to spread nervous feelings than it is to spread bedbugs.