US Tick Activity Hits 7-Year High as Lyme-Carrying Rates Reach 40% in Connecticut
Updated
Updated · CNN · Jul 13
US Tick Activity Hits 7-Year High as Lyme-Carrying Rates Reach 40% in Connecticut
3 articles · Updated · CNN · Jul 13
Summary
CDC data show US emergency-department visits for tick bites are at their highest for this point in the season in seven years, with elevated activity in every region and the Northeast leading.
Connecticut field data back that up: tick submissions and sweeps are running above last year and the previous 2017 high, while about 40% of tested blacklegged ticks carried Lyme bacteria versus a 32% historical rate.
Experts link the rise to warming temperatures, weather patterns, expanding deer and mouse hosts, and landscape changes such as suburbanization that help ticks spread into new areas.
The health burden is already large: Lyme may affect up to 476,000 Americans a year, anaplasmosis hit about 7,000 people in 2023, and some ticks now carry two or three pathogens at once.
Other vectors are also expanding, including lone star ticks tied to as many as 450,000 alpha-gal cases and Aedes mosquitoes moving north about 150 miles a year, reinforcing warnings that bug-borne disease risks are broadening.