Archive for the ‘Ticks’ Category

Sudden Red Meat Allergy Made Eating Painful For Mom and It’s All Because of a Tick Bite

https://www.godupdates.com/red-meat-allergy-tick-bite/

Sudden Red Meat Allergy Made Eating Painful For Mom And It’s All Because Of A Tick Bite

On July 9, 2019
red meat allergy lone star tick bite

Featured Image: Youtube/Inside Edition

A red meat allergy seemed to come out of nowhere and suddenly made eating painful for Janine Baumiller. And the cause is truly shocking. A lone star tick bite is behind all of the mom’s agony!

Mother of two Janine Baumiller of Long Island, New York sits watching her family enjoy juicy burgers. But she can’t take part herself. And it’s all because of a red meat allergy she never had before.

RELATED: Grieving Family Cautions Others Of Tick Bites After Losing 2-Year-Old

All of a sudden, any time Janine ate red meat, she’d later break out in hives all over, as well as experience severe burning under her skin. But what was even more shocking than Janine’s sudden reaction to red meat was why it was happening.

The allergy developed all because, at some point, Janine got bit by a lone star tick. A bite from this particular tick can activate an allergy to red meat, and in some cases, dairy, too.

WATCH: Lone Star Tick Bite Causes Red Meat Allergy

Janine now has to abstain from all red meat, sticking instead to poultry, fish, and veggies. And she’s not alone.

Kristie Downen of Springfield, Missouri, had the same experience.

“Food started hurting. It got to the point where my stomach would swell up, I was vomiting,” she said. “It’s still unbelievable that a tick would make you allergic to food.”

Experts call it the alpha-gal allergy and alarmingly, it’s on the rise. Up from 3,500 cases three years ago, there are now 5,000 known cases just in the U.S.

“It does seem like it’s really growing,” said Dr. Scott Commins, allergist and associate professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine.

More On The Lone Star Tick

The alpha-gal allergy comes from a bite from the lone star tick — “a very aggressive tick that bites humans” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“It appears the range of this tick is expanding,” Dr. Commins went on to say. “I also think it’s driven by folks are just encouraged to go outside more and perhaps they have more tick bites.”

The lone star tick is primarily found in the southeastern and eastern U.S., but is also starting to move further north. A white spot on the back of the lone star tick is what helps distinguish it from other ticks.

red meat allergy lone star tick bite

Dr. Thomas Platts-Mills, of allergy and clinical immunology at the University of Virginia, is the one who helped make the link between the lone star tick and the alpha-gal allergy. He, too, was bit and suffers from the red meat allergy.

Dr. Platts-Mills believes we’re seeing more of these ticks and the allergy it carries because of the increased deer population. A deer can carry up to 500 ticks and Dr. Platts-Mills says most of those are going to be the lone star tick.

“We’ve got deer on the lawns and they’re dropping these ticks everywhere,” Dr. Platts-Mills says.

Another interesting fact Dr. Platts-Mills points out is that most ticks are specific to a particular animal and prefer biting the animal to humans. But that’s not the case for the lone star tick.

“The lone star tick really does like humans,” Dr. Platts-Mills said.

More On The Tick-Induced Red Meat Allergy

Experts aren’t sure if the alpha-gal allergy is caused by one bite or multiple bites from a lone star tick. But they do know anyone can develop the reaction, even children.

Symptoms of the allergy often occur several hours after consuming red meat like beef, pork or lamb. Sometimes the allergy also includes a sensitivity to dairy, especially heavy-fat dairy like ice cream.

Someone suffering from the allergy can break out into hives, redness, itching and swelling, and even strong stomach cramping. Some can even have an anaphylactic reaction, which is life-threatening and requires the use of an Epi-pen.

The good news is the allergy typically goes away after two or three years. And those who suffer from it can still eat meat from fish, chicken, and turkey.

“If it swims or flies, it’s fine,” Dr. Commins said.

Doctors are also working on a vaccine, though it will be several more years before it’s ready.

Expert Tips For Avoiding Tick Bites

  • Ticks prefer heavier vegetation. So try to keep the grass in your yard from getting too tall. Avoid hiking or playing in heavily wooded areas as much as possible.
  • Try to keep skin covered with long sleeves and pants when venturing into the woods or thick grasses.
  • Try using a safe bug spray that repels ticks.
  • After spending time outdoors, do a thorough check of both your clothes and body, then take a shower.
  • Use a plastic baggie to save any ticks you find on your body, especially if you suspect you’ve been bitten. Look for the white dot on the back to identify a lone star tick.
  • If you suspect you’ve been bitten, keep an eye out for symptoms and keep in mind the reaction from the red meat allergy occurs several hours after eating. Doctors can perform a simple blood test to confirm the allergy.

Please be sure to share this story with others to raise awareness of the lone star tick and the red meat allergy.

h/t: Today

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For more:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/06/30/lone-star-tick-known-to-cause-red-meat-allergy-found-in-northern-wisconsin-report/  Yes, Martha, this fun-sucking tick is here in Wisconsin.

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2017/01/12/tick-related-red-meat-allergy-found-in-minnesota-wisconsin/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/05/20/how-a-tick-bite-can-give-you-a-red-meat-allergy/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/05/04/arkansas-woman-develops-deadly-meat-allergy-after-tick-bite/ For some, it’s way more than just red meat. For this woman, she had to omit ALL animal products, even ones found in supplements and personal care products.

 

Category:

Activism, Alpha Gal Meat Allergy, Ticks

Characteristics of Transfusion-Transmitted Babesia Microti, American Red Cross 2010-2017

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31250463/

2019 Jun 27. doi: 10.1111/trf.15425. [Epub ahead of print]

Characteristics of transfusion-transmitted Babesia microti, American Red Cross 2010-2017.

Tonnetti L1, Townsend RL1, Dodd RY1, Stramer SL1.

Abstract

BACKGROUND:

Babesia microti, a red blood cell (RBC) parasite transmitted naturally to vertebrate hosts by ixodid ticks, is endemic to the northeastern and upper midwestern United States, with the geographic range of infected ticks expanding. B. microti is a blood safety issue with >200 transfusion-transmissions reported.

METHODS:

The American Red Cross’s Hemovigilance program investigated hospital-reported transfusion-transmitted babesiosis (TTB) cases. Follow-up samples from involved donors were tested for B. microti antibodies and parasite DNA, the latter by real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Test-positive donors were permanently deferred from future donations.

RESULTS:

B. microti-positive donors were implicated in 77 of 143 suspect TTB cases investigated from 2010 through 2017. In four cases, two positive donors were identified for a total of 81 positive donors. In three cases, a RBC unit was split and components transfused multiple times to the same pediatric recipient. RBCs were the transmitting product in all cases. At follow-up, all involved donors were antibody positive; 25 donors were also PCR positive. Positive donations were collected throughout the year, peaking in the summer. Most donors (78) were resident of, or traveled to (2), an endemic state. One donor resided in a non-endemic state without relevant travel history. One fatality listed babesia as a contributing factor. No implicated donation was screened by an investigational protocol.

CONCLUSIONS:

Babesiosis remains a blood safety issue. Prior to FDA-licensed screening test availability and final FDA Guidance, blood collectors in endemic states investigationally tested none, a portion, or all collections. Future expanded testing will reduce the frequency of TTB cases.

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**Comment**

This clearly shows there were more than 200 Babesia transfusion-transmissions reported. It also shows you don’t have to reside in an endemic area or travel to an endemic area to get it. The article also clearly points out that the geographic range of ticks is expanding, which means the pathogens they carry will as well.

More on Babesia:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/01/16/babesia-treatment/

Babesia, as well as Lyme is under reported. Research hardly exists on those with both. We desperately need to know what concurrent infection is doing to patients. It only makes logical sense that their cases are more severe and of greater duration, yet mainstream research and medicine doesn’t blink at this issue:

Going back to 1998, it was known that when a patient has Lyme and Babesia, Lyme is found three-times more frequently in the blood, causing greater symptoms, disease severity, and duration of illness:  https://reference.medscape.com/medline/abstract/8637139

What happens when a patient has Lyme, Babesia, and Bartonella and maybe a few viruses thrown in for good measure?  Nobody’s studied this, yet it is common scenario in Lyme-land:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/10/30/study-shows-lyme-msids-patients-infected-with-many-pathogens-and-explains-why-we-are-so-sick/

Category:

Babesia, research, Testing, Ticks

Not All Lyme Rashes Are Created Equal

https://globallymealliance.org/not-all-lyme-rashes-are-created-equal/

Copy-of-MyLymeLife_2-5

by Jennifer Crystal

Lyme disease: that’s the illness you get when you find a bulls-eye rash, right?

It very well could be, but here’s the catch. The bulls-eye rash isn’t the only sign of Lyme disease. Nor does every Lyme rash (Erythema Migrans or EM) present as a target with red rings around it. To assume that Lyme always comes with a bulls-eye rash is, in fact, to be way off target and—worse—poorly informed when it comes to diagnosing the disease.

In fact, less than 50% of Lyme patients ever find a bulls-eye rash, or any rash at all. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have Lyme. It means they, and their doctors, will need to look a little further.

I found a rash on my forearm in the summer of 1997 while working at a camp in Maine. It wasn’t a bulls-eye shape. It was a series of red dots, sort of stippled, that extended from my wrist almost to my elbow. It wasn’t raised and it didn’t itch.

“It’s probably from your sleeping bag or something,” the camp nurse said. In 1997 Lyme disease was not on the public health radar or mine, which is ironic since I grew up in Connecticut where the disease was first discovered.

That same summer I developed hypoglycemia, which I later learned is a common symptom of the tick-borne disease babesia, a co-infection of Lyme. That fall I was bedridden with flu-like symptoms. Had I presented these symptoms, and my rash, to medical professionals today, they might have seen a pattern and tested me for tick-borne illnesses. Lyme literacy is improving, but not all doctors look at individual symptoms in a big picture way—and that pesky myth of the bulls-eye rash, especially if you don’t have one, still persists, which is why I continue to share my story.

Sample Em-RashEM rashes present in many different ways. Some are small. Some are big and blotchy. Some are spotted. Some are pink and some are bright red. If these sentences are starting to sound like a Dr. Seuss book, it’s because the lesson they contain is simple. If you find any type of rash at all, especially during the summer months, and if you subsequently experience symptoms of tick-borne illness, do not assume your rash is nothing. Show it to a Lyme Literate Medical Doctor (LLMD), who you can find here.

If you, your children, or your pets spend time outdoors, it’s important to do nightly tick checks of everyone exposed. As you are looking for culprits, also keep your eye out for rashes of all kinds. They don’t always appear in obvious places. A rash could be on your back—have someone else look!—in your groin, between your toes, behind your ears, or on your scalp.

And a rash might not be there at all, but you can have Lyme disease without ever getting one. Therefore, in addition to checking yourself for ticks and rashes, it’s important that you keep an eye out for typical Lyme symptoms. If you experience flu-like symptoms such as fatigue, joint aches, headaches, neuropathy, Bell’s palsy, or any other unusual symptom, do not brush it off as a summer flu.

Maybe you’ll get lucky, and that’s all it will be, the summer flu. But it’s better to be safe than sorry; let an LLMD make that call. You will also want to keep an eye out for symptoms of co-infections, like the hypoglycemia which I experienced.

Of course, if you are lucky enough to find a bulls-eye rash, take it as an unequivocal sign: you have Lyme disease. Do not wait to see if you develop symptoms.That can take months. By which time the disease, and possibly co-infections, will have spread further into your system and may cross the blood-brain barrier. Then the disease(s) will be much harder to treat.

In a way, finding a bulls-eye rash is like winning the lottery. If you’re smart, you have a ticket to immediate diagnosis and treatment. Moreover, it’s unlikely that you won’t have to deal with chronic symptoms and long-term treatments. If you aren’t so lucky as to win a bulls-eye, keep looking for ticks, atypical rashes, and symptoms of tick-borne disease.

I wish you all a Lyme-free summer!


Opinions expressed by contributors are their own.

Jennifer Crystal is a writer and educator in Boston. She has written a memoir, One Tick Stopped the Clock, for which she is seeking representation. Contact her at: lymewarriorjennifercrystal@gmail.com. 

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**Comment**

Those getting the Bull’s Eye rash vary considerably – 25-80%. I never got one, my husband never got one, and hardly anyone I work with gets one….makes you wonder who on earth is lucky enough to get it!  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/02/22/why-mainstream-lyme-msids-research-remains-in-the-dark-ages/

The EM rash criteria is often required for entrance into research studies as well as positive test results on blood serology that misses over half of all cases.  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/09/12/lyme-testing-problems-solutions/

Time to move on from these antiquated parameters cutting out a huge subset of patients in research without the rash and who sometimes NEVER test positive on the CDC 2-tiered testing. Who’s studying these people? Nobody….

 

 

 

 

Category:

Lyme, Ticks

Seroepidemiological & Molecular Investigation of Spotted Fever Group Rickettsiae & Coxiella Burnetii in Sao Tome Island: A One Health Approach

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31231971

Seroepidemiological and molecular investigation of spotted fever group rickettsiae and Coxiella burnetii in Sao Tome Island: A One Health approach.

Hsi TE1, Hsiao SW1, Minahan NT1, Yen TY1, de Assunção Carvalho AV2, Raoult D3, Fournier PE4,5, Tsai KH1,6.

Abstract

Spotted fever group rickettsiae (SFGR) and Coxiella burnetii are intracellular bacteria that cause potentially life-threatening tick-borne rickettsioses and Q fever respectively. Sao Tome and Principe (STP), small islands located in the Gulf of Guinea, recently experienced a dramatic reduction in the incidence of malaria owing to international collaborative efforts. However, unexplained febrile illnesses persist. A One Health approach was adopted to investigate exposure to SFGR and C. burnetii in humans and examine the diversity of these bacteria in ticks parasitizing domestic ruminants. A cross-sectional human serological study was conducted in Agua Grande district in Sao Tome Island from January to March 2016, and ticks were collected from farmed domestic ruminants in 2012 and 2016. In total, 240 individuals varying in age were randomly screened for exposure to SFGR and C. burnetii by indirect immunofluorescence assay. Twenty of 240 individuals (8.3%) were seropositive for SFGR (4 for Rickettsia africae and 16 for R. conorii) and 16 (6.7%) were seropositive for C. burnetii. Amblyomma astrion were collected exclusively in 2012, as were A. variegatum in 2016 and Rickettsia spp. were detected in 22/42 (52.4%) and 49/60 (81.7%) respectively. Sequence analysis of multiple gene targets from Rickettsia spp. detected in ticks suggests the presence of a single divergent R. africae strain (Sao Tome). While no ticks were found positive for C. burnetii, Coxiella-like endosymbionts were detected in nearly all ticks.

This is the first study in STP to provide serological evidence in humans of SFGR and C. burnetii and additional molecular evidence in ticks for SFGR, which may be responsible for some of the unexplained febrile illnesses that persist despite the control of malaria. Future epidemiological studies are needed to confirm the occurrence and risk factors associated with SFG rickettsioses and Q fever in both humans and animals.

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For more:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/03/20/rocky-mountain-spotted-fever-is-not-the-only-rickettsiosis/

Great article on SFGR: https://www.galaxydx.com/rickettsia-spp/

C. burnetii:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/03/28/human-tick-borne-diseases-in-australia/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/10/18/study-finds-q-fever-rickettsia-typhus-in-australian-ticks-and-people/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/02/03/understanding-q-fever-risk-to-minnesotans/  Excerpt: 

The CDC reports that 60% of cases are in patients without livestock contact (CDC unpublished data, 2010) and the need for health-care professionals to consider Q fever in the differential diagnosis in patients with a compatible illness, even in the absence of occupational risk or history of direct contact with animal reservoirs.

Supposedly, he United States ended its biological warfare program in 1969. When it did, C. burnetii was one of seven agents it had standardized as biological weapons.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coxiella_burnetii

Q Fever can cause acute or chronic illness.

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/803800
Excellent video by Alicia Anderson, DVM, MPH on new CDC guidelines for Q Fever

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/06/24/other-arthropod-borne-bacteria-causing-nonmalarial-fever-in-ethiopia/  African patients presenting with fever but testing negative for malaria had DNA for these pathogens: Borrelia spp., Francisella spp. Rickettsia spp. and Bartonella. Thus, in this rural area of Africa, febrile symptoms could be due to bacteria transmitted by arthropods.

 

 

 

Category:

Q Fever, research, Rickettsia, Testing, Ticks

Researchers at Upstate Medical University Collect CNY Ticks For Testing in a Pilot Study

https://www.localsyr.com/news/local-news/researchers-at-upstate-medical-university-collect-cny-ticks-for-testing-in-a-pilot-study/ News Video Here

Researchers at Upstate Medical University collect CNY ticks for testing in a pilot study

LOCAL NEWS

by:

Posted:

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (WSYR-TV) — A team of researchers with Thangamani Lab at Upstate Medical University have begun a multi-year pilot project studying the ticks in the Central New York region.

They’re trying to figure out which species of ticks are in the area, what they’re carrying, and how those infections impact a person’s health and their treatment.

“The deer ticks, they transmit 7 different pathogens,” said lead researcher, Saravanan Thangamani. “Almost 60% of ticks collected in Onondaga County are positive for Borrelia burgdorferi. That is the agent for Lyme disease.”

Some of the ticks also carry infections like Powassan virus, Ehrlichia, and Bartonella.

One of the goals of this 3-5 year study is to understand what happens if a tick bites someone when it’s carrying more than one infection.

“Does it make the Lyme disease worse, does it make the Powassan worse, or it doesn’t do neither?” asks Thangamani.

Researchers are also trying to track down the ticks’ path. To do so, they’re asking anyone who gets bit by a tick to mail it in for free testing.

“Send us the zip code so we know which zip code has particular pathogen prevalence and then does it change over time,” said Thangamani.

To have a tick tested, put it in a zip-lock bag with a moist towelette with the following information:

  • The date
  • Location
  • If the tick was found on a human or pet
  • Your email

More info:  https://thangamani-lab.com/free-tick-testing

You can mail the tick to:

Thangamani Lab
505 Irving Avenue
Suite 4209
SUNY Center for Environmental Health and Medicine
SUNY Upstate Medical Center
Syracuse, NY 13210
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**Comment**

I called and they stated anyone can utilize their FREE tick testing. 
They will send you the results of what pathogens were found.

Category:

Activism, Bartonella, Ehrlichiosis, Lyme, Testing, Ticks, Viruses