Tick bite trips to the ER are on the rise in 2025. What to know about tick season
Just because a tick lands on or bites you doesn't guarantee that you will contract Lyme disease or any of the other diseases they spread.
Here's what to know about tick season and some tips to help you identify and remove a tick.
This year's tick season has been extremely active, leading to a surge in ER visits because of tick bites, particularly in the Northeast. This year's figures are the highest since 2019, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Story continues after photo gallery.
Of the nearly 900 species of ticks in the world, the United States is home to nearly 50 species, according to the National Institutes of Health. Although only a few kinds of ticks can transmit disease to people, those species are growing in numbers and reach.
According to IN.gov, there are about 15 different species of ticks in Indiana, but only four of those are typically encountered by Hoosiers and their pets.
Ticks use your body heat, breath, movement and smell to find you. They also employ a variety of methods to locate their victims.
Some prefer to wait in leaf litter or dead logs, and others like to scale tall grass or other vegetation, according to the Mayo Clinic.
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If you are returning indoors after being outside, it's a good idea to check your clothes and body for ticks.
Ticks can be as small as a poppy seed. For a disease to be transmitted, a tick must stay connected to its host for 24 to 36 hours.
By removing the tick promptly, you can reduce the chance of becoming infected. Here are some tips on how to deal with a tick:
Here's the proper way to remove a tick:
According to the CDC, specific tick species can spread diseases like Lyme disease, southern tick-associated rash sickness (STARI) and Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF) in certain regions of the nation.
Not all ticks carry infections, but waiting too long to remove one from your skin can raise the risk of transmission.
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'This is a very solid study, matching dietary interventions for nutrients and food group distribution, while varying only the contribution of ultra-processed foods,' said Dr. David Katz, a specialist in preventive and lifestyle medicine, in an email. Katz, who was not involved in the study, is the founder of the nonprofit True Health Initiative, a global coalition of experts dedicated to evidence-based lifestyle medicine. The study's goal was weight loss, which often comes with improved cardiovascular readings, such as lower blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar levels. That happened, but in rather odd and surprising ways, said Marion Nestle, the Paulette Goddard professor emerita of nutrition, food studies and public health at New York University, who was asked to write an editorial to be published with the study. Instead of gaining weight, people on the ultraprocessed diet chose to eat 120 fewer calories a day, thus losing a small amount of weight. 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'People in this study were overweight or obese and were already eating a diet high in all kinds of ultraprocessed foods,' Gardner said. 'So the ultraprocessed diet in the study was healthier than their typical normal diet. Isn't that an odd twist?' People on the minimally processed diet had lower levels of triglycerides, a type of fat in the blood linked to an increased risk of heart disease and stroke, but other markers of heart health didn't vary much between the two diets, according to the study. There was one notable exception: low-density lipoprotein, or LDL, known as 'bad' cholesterol because it can build up in arteries and create blockages to the heart. 'Surprisingly, LDL cholesterol was reduced more on the ultra-processed diet,' said dietitian Dimitrios Koutoukidis, an associate professor of diet, obesity and behavioral sciences at the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the study. 'This might imply that processing is not as important for heart health if the foods already meet the standard UK healthy eating guidance,' Koutoukidis said in a statement. 'Further research is needed to better understand this.' According to Hall, the results fit quite nicely with preliminary results from his current study that is still underway. In that research, Hall and his team measured the impact of four configurations of ultraprocessed foods on the health of 36 volunteers. Each lived for a month in the Metabolic Clinical Research Unit of the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. 'When you modify an ultraprocessed diet to have lower energy (calorie) density and fewer highly palatable foods, you can offset some of the effects of ultraprocessed foods in causing excess calorie intake and weight gain,' Hall said. In other words, choose healthier foods regardless of the levels of processing. 'People don't eat the best ultraprocessed foods, they eat the worst ones, so the take home here is to follow the national guidelines for nutrient quality,' Gardner said. 'Read your nutrient label and choose foods that are low in salt, fat, sugar and calories and high in fiber, and avoid foods with too many additives with unpronounceable names. That's the key to a healthier diet.' Sign up for CNN's Eat, But Better: Mediterranean Style. Our eight-part guide shows you a delicious expert-backed eating lifestyle that will boost your health for life.
