Our province has a natural environment suitable for ticks to live, and every year in May ~ July is the peak period of tick activity, and the chance of being bitten by ticks when people play and work outdoors has increased significantly, and tick-borne diseases have also entered a high incidence period.
Small ticks
Dawei Hu
Scientific prevention of ticks
Here's what you need to know!
What are Ticks?
Ticks, commonly known as ticks, ticks, grass crawlers, dog beans, eight-legged seeds, etc., usually parasitize rodents, domestic animals and other parts of the body with thin skin and are not easy to be scratched, and can attach to grass after leaving the host animal. Generally, it is reddish-brown or gray-brown, oblong-ovate, dorsal and ventral flattened, ranging from the size of sesame grains to the size of rice grains, and the insect body swells like the size of soybeans after sucking blood.
There are more than 800 species of ticks known in the world, and more than 110 species have been found in the mainland, including the common long-horned blood ticks, blood-red fan-headed ticks, microscopic cattle ticks, etc., among which the long-horned blood ticks are the dominant tick species in our province.
2. How do ticks find their hosts?
Ticks find their host by probing the animal's breath, smell, body temperature, humidity, and vibrations. To find the host more easily, the tick climbs onto the plant and stretches its legs, usually waiting for the host at the tip of the grass and the top of the branches and leaves of the bush, and when the host passes by, it will quickly contact the host and then move over the host until it finds a suitable location to suck blood.
3. What are the dangers of tick bites?
Ticks are vector organisms, carrying 83 kinds of viruses, 31 kinds of bacteria, 32 kinds of protozoa, often through biting and sucking blood to transmit viruses, bacteria, parasites and other pathogens to make people sick, most of which are important natural epidemic diseases and zoonoses, such as fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome, forest encephalitis, tick-borne hemorrhagic fever, Q fever, tick-borne typhus, Lyme disease, human granulocytic anaplasmosis, Bartonella infection, etc.
At present, the main tick-borne disease in our province is fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome, the main clinical manifestations are fever, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, etc., and some patients have headache, muscle aches, and diarrhea. Through timely symptomatic treatment, the prognosis of the vast majority of patients is good, and only a few patients with severe disease can have changes in mental status, bleeding, etc., and eventually die due to damage to multiple organs such as liver, kidney, and heart.
Where are ticks distributed in our province?
The distribution of ticks is related to climate, topography, soil, vegetation and host, among others. Ticks in our province are mostly distributed in mountainous areas, hills and other areas with lush vegetation, so there is a high chance of being bitten by ticks during outdoor activities such as camping, tea picking, and farming.
How can I prevent tick bites?
1. Reduce exposure to high-risk places. Try to avoid sitting and drying clothes for a long time in the main habitats of ticks such as grasslands and woods. If you need to enter such areas, you should wear personal protection, such as wearing long-sleeved, light-coloured, smooth clothing, tightening your trouser legs or tucking them into your socks/shoes, and not wearing sandals.
2. Do a good job of protection before outdoor activities. During the tick season, use a product containing 0.5% permethrin to treat clothing, boots, and camping equipment before outdoor activities such as camping, tea picking, farming, etc., and spray it multiple times to maintain the protective effect, or you can purchase clothes and equipment treated with permethrin. Apply DEET, isopropydine and other repellents to bare skin.
3. Check for tick attachment or bites in time after outdoor activities. Ticks can be attached to clothing and pet body surface, enter the room to carefully inspect the coat, backpack and pet, focusing on the lower part of the arm, the inside and around the ear, the inside or around the hair, the inside of the navel, the back of the knee, the waist, the root of the leg and other parts, found that the tick should be removed in time.
What should a person do after being bitten by a tick?
Ticks often attach to the scalp, waist, armpits, groin, and ankles of the human body, and should be removed as soon as possible if they are found to be attached to the skin.
Clamp the tick as close to the surface of the skin as possible with clean, fine-tipped forceps and pull upwards with steady, even force, without twisting, jerking, irritating the tick with fire, etc., which may cause the tick's mouthparts to fall off and remain in the skin. If it is convenient, you can also spray the tick body with alcohol and then remove the tick with pointed tweezers. It is important to remove the tick as soon as possible! After removing the tick, thoroughly clean the bite site and hands with iodine, alcohol, or soap and water.
If you develop fever, fatigue, or muscle aches within 2 weeks of tick removal, seek medical attention as soon as possible and take the initiative to tell your doctor about possible tick exposure.