Lyme disease causes a significant financial and health burden. Recent advances in developing new Lyme disease vaccines have renewed optimism that vaccination may serve as an additional strategy to reduce this burden. Vaccination alone will not address the broader relevant public health challenges posed by ticks. Our experience with prior Lyme disease vaccines suggests that even an effective vaccine would not fully reduce the incidence of human disease. Importantly, vaccination against genospecies would not affect tick abundance or exposure risk. It would also not mitigate the transmission of other tick-borne pathogens that are proliferating in human-biting ticks. Tick-borne disease risk is shaped by the biological features of ticks and tick-borne disease agents, which differ from those of mosquitoes and mosquito-borne disease agents. Unique tick characteristics create opportunities for exposure and complicate prevention and post-exposure case management. In addition to infectious diseases, ticks are associated with non-infectious conditions such as tick paralysis and alpha-gal syndrome that will not be affected by a Lyme disease vaccine. The introduction of a Lyme disease vaccine should be viewed as one part of a broader risk management strategy. Emphasis must remain on clinical awareness and education for at-risk individuals. Personal protective behaviours, surveillance, and integrated tick control will also be essential to managing tick-associated health risks in both vaccinated and unvaccinated populations.
In the northeastern USA, the distribution of lone star ticks () has expanded northward in recent decades, overlapping with the range of blacklegged ticks (). Blacklegged ticks carry pathogens for diseases such as Lyme, babesiosis, and anaplasmosis, while bites from lone star ticks cause other diseases and the alpha-gal syndrome allergy. Lone star ticks can become so abundant that they are perceived as more of a public health threat than blacklegged ticks. Using the island of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, as a case study, we analyzed data from a total of 1265 yard surveys from 2011 to 2024 to document lone star tick presence and subsequent expansion from two peripheral areas, Chappaquiddick and Aquinnah, to all six towns. The timing of lone star tick expansion on Martha's Vineyard closely matched an increase in tick submissions to a pathogen testing center. At Chappaquiddick, drag sampling carried out in June 2023 and 2024 showed that both tick species were most common at wooded sites, where blacklegged nymphs were somewhat more abundant than lone star nymphs. However, lone star ticks occurred in a wider range of natural and peridomestic habitats than blacklegged nymphs, making them far more challenging for people to avoid and manage.
Snow AA, Pearson P, Xu G, Allen DN, Santamaria R, et al.
Insects •
Tick-borne diseases and a tick-induced red meat allergy have become increasingly common in the northeastern USA and elsewhere. At the scale of local communities, few studies have documented tick densities or infection levels to characterize current conditions and provide a baseline for further monitoring. Using the town of Nantucket, MA, as a case study, we recorded tick densities by drag sampling along hiking trails in nature preserves on two islands. Nymphal blacklegged ticks ( Say) were most abundant at shadier sites and least common in grasslands and scrub oak thickets (). Lone star ticks ( L.) were common on Tuckernuck Island and rare on Nantucket Island, while both tick species were more numerous in 2021 compared to 2020 and 2022. We tested for pathogens in blacklegged nymphs at five sites over two years. In 2020 and 2021, infection levels among the four Nantucket Island sites averaged 10% vs. 19% for , 11% vs. 15% for and 17% (both years) for , while corresponding levels were significantly greater on Tuckernuck in 2021. Our site-specific, quantitative approach represents a practical example of how potential exposure to tick-borne diseases can be monitored on a local scale.
Acidic polysaccharides are attractive functional ingredients in shellfish which are consumed as delicious and nutritious foods world widely. In the present study, acidic polysaccharides from 21 species of edible shellfish were characterized and quantified by analyzing their repeated disaccharides using the multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode of triple quadrupole mass spectrometer upon acid degradation and 1-phenyl-3-methyl-5-pyrazolone (PMP) derivatization. A total of 6 glycosaminoglycans (GAGs) and 8 non-GAGs with repeated disaccharide units of a hexuronic acid linked to a hexosamine or a hexose were detected. Among them, chondroitin sulfate, heparin, →4)-β-GlcA-(1 → 2)-α-Man-(1 → and →3)- β-GlcA-(1 → 3)-α-Gal-(1 → were identified unambiguously by comparing with the references. The quantification results revealed that the contents of these polysaccharide varied greatly among shellfish species with a maximum over 100 mg/100 g. Furthermore, the dendrogram of hierarchical clustering analysis indicated that the composition of acidic polysaccharides in some shellfish species was related with the genetic relationship. Thus, the present study provides a more comprehensive knowledge about the distribution of acidic polysaccharides in various shellfish species.
