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Health Unit shares Safety and Prevention Tips for Ticks as temperatures start rising

It’s definitely the right season for ticks.  

That from the Teresina (Teri) Palangio, Public Health Inspector with the North Bay Parry Sound District Health Unit. 

Palangio says the health unit starts to see them in the active season when the daytime temperatures are consistently above zero. She says that’s typically around April to September. 

“If people are out and about, especially in areas with long grass or in wilderness areas, there’s more chance of an encounter in those environments. Some of the ticks, specifically the Black-legged Tick, can spread diseases. Specifically, like Lyme disease and there are some others now that we’re aware of like anaplasmosis, babesiosis, Powassan virus disease,” she says. 

When it comes to preventing encounters with tiny critters, Palangio says it’s important to know that ticks can’t jump or fly. She says they’re nicknamed ‘Nature’s Hitchhiker’ because they climb onto grass or leaves, typically below the knee height, and could cling on to a host that’s walking by.  

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“If you’re walking on a trail in the woods, for example, you could maybe stick to the center of the trail to avoid brushing against the foliage. Especially up to that knee height where we know the ticks typically latch onto a host. And at home folks can make outdoor spaces that they enjoy safer by reducing leaf litter and cutting vegetation short because ticks prefer shady, cool, and humid environments,” she says. Palangio adds ticks are generally not found in areas that are hot and dry without foliage. 

“When going out into the long grass or wilderness areas, you want to wear long sleeves, long pants, tuck our shirt into the pants, and tuck our pants into the socks. That way we’re covering up the clothing gaps. We are encouraging people to use an insect repellent that’s meant for people and used according to label direction,” Palangio says. 

She says the products, like DEET, should have a pest control product or a PCP number and should indicate somewhere on it whether it’s effective against ticks. 

She says it’s also a good idea to wear light-colored clothing because that makes tick spotting easier when you’re doing a body search after returning from the outdoors.  

“People can have someone help check the spots they can’t see, like on their back, and so on. It’s a good idea to check pets too, of course, because they’re that perfect height. As they’re running through the woods the ticks like to grab onto them so they can carry the ticks into the house,” she says. She adds animals and humans may exhibit symptoms differently. 

Palangio says ticks, at basically any stage of their life cycle, can be killed simply by placing your clothing in the dryer on the hot setting for 20 minutes after you get back from the outdoors. If the tick is found attached and feeding on a person, she says you want to remove it right away as soon as possible.  

“You can do that by grasping the tick with tweezers as close to the mouth parts or the attachment site as possible, and then you gently pull straight upward with steady pressure. It’s important not to crush the tick or apply products that could cause the tick to release its stomach contents because that can actually increase the risk of infection,” Palangio says. 

She says the tick can then be placed in a sealed container, and it can be brought to the health unit where it might be identified or sent to a lab for testing. The health unit does accept ticks that are found on humans.  

“The reason for that is we do surveillance in our region. Test results are shared with the person who submits the tick, but the results are not supposed to inform their medical decisions. So, we encourage anyone who has a tick bite to seek medical attention as soon as they get it because treatment might be recommended for possible exposure to disease,” Palangio says. 

When ticks bite, she says usually people don’t feel it and it doesn’t get itchy like say a mosquito bite would.  

But Palangio says what people might notice shortly after a tick bite is a bullseye rash with circles that radiate out from the site of the bite. She says it’s important to know not everybody gets that, so when people say they don’t have a bullseye rash, that doesn’t mean they weren’t exposed. Other symptoms include flu-like symptoms. 

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