RI Health Officials Urge Tick Prevention With Lyme Disease On The Rise

RHODE ISLAND — With warmer weather now here, and with the Rhode Island seeing high rates of Lyme Disease, state health and environmental officials are urging people to take precautions to prevent tick bites.

After a mild winter in which more ticks than usual have likely survived into the spring, 2023 may be a bad year for tick bites and the transmission of Lyme disease and other tick-borne diseases. The Northeast in particular has been hit harder with Lyme disease than any other region in the U.S.

Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that as of May, 86 of every 100,000 emergency room visits in the Northeast have been for treatment of a tick bite in 2023. The tick bite tracker has reporting limitations, but is helpful overall in helping people determine where ticks are most active, the agency said.

"While Rhode Islanders are enjoying the great outdoors, we need to make sure we’re all taking these three key steps to preventing Lyme and other tick-borne diseases: Repel, check, remove," Interim Rhode Island Director of Health Utpala Bandy said. "Repel and reduce your exposure to ticks, check your body for ticks in the spots that they like to crawl and hide, and be sure to promptly and properly remove ticks if you find one on yourself, your family members, or your pets. Ticks are tiny, and you may not be able to feel them or spot them right away. The sooner you find and remove them, the better your chances are at preventing the serious health issues caused by Lyme and other diseases ticks carry."

Officials with the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management said the increasing numbers of ticks could be attributed to a variety of environmental factors that are symptomatic of climate change such as more moderate winters, hotter temperatures in the summer, and more rainfall.

"As the weather warms and Rhode Islanders begin returning to state parks, campgrounds, and management areas, so do ticks,"DEM Director Terry Gray said. "DEM and the RIDOH (Rhode Island Department of Health) cooperate on a wide array of programs and initiatives to protect public health. Public education is critical. Again this year, DEM welcomes the chance to make RIDOH’s informative tick bite-prevention materials available for our park and campground visitors."

As a part of 2023's tick prevention campaign, RIDOH launched a new, interactive dashboard with data on several tick-borne diseases, including Lyme disease, anaplasmosis, babesiosis, and ehrlichiosis. The dashboard makes data available by case counts and case rates by year, sex, county, city, and town. The dashboard is available here.

According to RIDOH officials, Rhode Island had 2,324 cases of Lyme disease in 2022. There were 980 cases of Lyme in Rhode Island in 2021. State officials said the increase is a result of a change in the case definition for Lyme.

Historically, the national reporting standard for Lyme disease required healthcare providers to report specific clinical information on all potential cases of Lyme disease. In 2022, the national reporting standard changed. The national case definition for Lyme disease no longer requires the reporting of clinical information for cases in high-incidence states, like Rhode Island. It counts laboratory tests only, and that results in more cases being included in the count.

Here are some tips to avoid Lyme disease from RIDOH:

Repel

Keep ticks off you, your children, and pets by:

• Avoiding wooded and brushy areas with high grass and leaves. If you are going to be in a wooded area, walk in the center of the trail to avoid contact with overgrown grass, brush, and leaves at the edges of the trail. You can also spray your clothes with permethrin to keep ticks away. Make sure to not spray this on your skin.
• Wearing long pants and long-sleeve shirts when outside.
• Tucking your pants into your socks, so ticks do not crawl under your clothes.
• Wearing light-colored clothing, so you can see ticks more easily.

Check

Check yourself, your children, and pets, for ticks by:

• Taking a shower as soon as you come inside if you have been in grassy or wooded areas.
• Doing a full-body tick check using a mirror; parents should check their kids for ticks and pay special attention to the area in and around the ears, in the belly button, behind the knees, between the legs, around the waist, and in their hair.
• Checking your pets for ticks as well because they can bring ticks into the home.

Remove

Remove ticks from your body, as well as from children and pets, if you find them.

• Use a set of tweezers to remove the tick. Grasp the tick as close to the skin as possible and pull straight up.
• If you don't have tweezers, use your fingers with a tissue or rubber gloves.