BALTIMORE COUNTY, Md. — Outdoor enthusiasts beware. Tick season is here, and notably worse than last spring.
In April, emergency department visits were up 25% from last April, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), indicating an aggressive tick season to persist.
This number does not include visits to Primary Care Physicians or Urgent Care for tick bites.
"It seems that we're in for a very bad year. And of course, these numbers are only the tip of an iceberg," said Nicole Baumgarth, an immunologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and leads the Lyme and Tickborne Diseases Research and Education Institute.
At Cromwell Valley Park near the Loch Raven Resevoir, plenty of hikers were enjoying Tuesday's beautiful spring day to enjoy the sunshine and warm temperatures.
But the time spent outside was spent cautiously.
"A couple of my friends have already have found some ticks on them, so luckily no deer ticks as far as I know, but it is scary to hear that," mom Kaitlin Duffy said.
Leise Ballou is an avid hiker and part of the Mountain club of Maryland.
"A lot of my friends in there ... have had severe Lyme, " she said. "So, I'm scared to death of it,"
She doesn't take any risks, as she spends five days a week outside. She always wears long pants and sleeves, clothes treated with permethrin and immediately washes off when she gets home.
And with the news of the increase in tick bites, she's planning to pull her socks over her pants as well.
HOW TO PREVENT TICK BITES:
Information provided by the Maryland State Department of Health
- Use insect repellents, such as DEET, picaridin, or IR3535
- Wear light-colored clothing
- Wear long pants and sleeves, and tuck your pants into your socks/boots
- Treat clothing and gear with permethrin
- Shower as soon as possible after returning indoors
- Dry your clothes on high heat for 10 minutes
In 2024, more than 3,000 cases of Lyme disease were reported in Maryland, according to MDH. Symptoms were similar to having the flu, including rash, fever, headache, joint pain and fatigue.
Most Lyme disease can be treated with antibiotics but if left untreated, it can spread to your joints and nervous system so it's important to seek medical care if you have suspect you've been bitten.
Public health experts blame the increase in ticks on milder winters due to climate change, which allows them to survive for longer.
"Even when there are colder winters, so for example, on the East Coast last year, the increased snowfall that comes along with that can provide a more insulated cover which ticks can stay warm, sort of acting like an igloo," said infectious disease microbiologist Thomas Hart, who studies Lyme disease bacteria.
There is currently no vaccine against tick-borne illnesses, but there are clinical trials ongoing for a Lyme disease vaccine.
Even if it's widely received, it won't prevent everything these pests can carry, Baumgarth points out.
"I'm thinking about Babesiosis, an increasing disease of a small parasite that infects red blood cells and threatens the safety of our blood supply. Or the Alpha-Gal syndrome, an allergic reaction to eating red meat," Baumgarth explains.
The latter is caused by what's called the Amblyomma tick (aka Lone Star tick), now the most commonly found tick in Maryland and aggressively moving north.
