The appearance of more ticks than normal, has folks worrying about more Lyme Disease

tick insect warning sign in forest
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Channel 4 reports

Erie County Health Commissioner Dr. Gale Burstein says she’s anticipating a large number of Lyme disease cases this summer and that’s because we’re seeing a lot of reports of ticks found in the community.

 

So, what can we do?  Burstein gave News 4 some tips:

She says the best protection is prevention. That includes making sure your lawn is cut and hedges are trimmed, giving ticks less of a chance to move onto people.  It’s also important to cover your skin with pants and long sleeves as much as possible and high socks.  If you can’t do that, use insect repellent with at least 25% DEET and doing a tick check on your body after being outside is also important.

Important to remember that not all ticks carry the disease.

“Only about 50% of adult ticks and about 20% of the nymphs are infected with Lyme disease. Just because you do have a tick bite doesn’t mean you’ll be infected… If it’s treated with early Lyme disease it has a very good prognosis for full recovery,”

If you do discover a tick on your body, remove it with tweezers.

Symptoms of Lyme disease, are "a specific rash that looks like a bull’s eye. It’s treated with commonly-used antibiotics.:

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