Warmer spring weather translates to the start of tick season in Connecticut, and this year state scientists will be starting a new program to trap and monitor ticks in all eight Connecticut counties, including new and emerging tick threats.
The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station’s tick monitoring effort will involve trapping ticks for testing at 40 locations across the state. The program is being paid for using $96,000 from the federal Centers for Disease Control.
“This will give us a clearer, better understanding” of tick-borne diseases in all sections of Connecticut, Theodore G. Andreadis, director of the New Haven-based experiment station, said Friday.
Andreadis said the onset of warmer weather means tick season is already underway. He urged all Connecticut residents who spend time outdoors — gardening, taking care of lawns, hiking or simply enjoying nature — to always check themselves for ticks and take preventative measures.
“It’s always bad,” Andreadis said when asked if 2019’s tick season is expected to be better or worse than last year’s. “We have so much suitable habitat and this past winter wasn’t severe enough to knock [tick numbers] down.”
The CDC-funded tick surveillance effort “is a brand new program,” Andreadis said. “We’ve never before received money from the CDC for tick surveillance.”
The monitoring program is intended to provide far more detailed information about the abundance and distribution of various tick species and how prevalent some of the existing and newly emerging tick-borne diseases are in this state.
Ticks are the primary transmitter of Lyme disease, but different types of ticks can also infect people with babesiosis, anaplasmosis, a relapsing fever called borreliosis, Rocky Mountain spotted fever and the emerging threat of the Powassan virus.
The tick species that will be collected for testing include the blacklegged tick, which is commonly known as the deer tick, and American dog ticks.
The program will also be looking for the spread of two types of ticks that have only recently been identified in Connecticut: the Lone star tick, a southern species that has spread to the southern part of the state; and the invasive Asian longhorned tick.
Andreadis said the CAES is now requesting an increase in federal funding for tick monitoring to $160,000 a year.
“We want to do more,” he said. “This year’s money is not entirely adequate to do what we want to do.”
Since 1990, Connecticut residents and institutions have been able to send in ticks to the CAES to be identified and tested for Lyme disease. The state-funded program tests 3,000 to 4,000 ticks annually.
The CAES is also part of a regional study and educational effort dealing with vector-borne diseases, which are those transmitted to humans by ticks, mosquitoes or other insects or animals. The experiment station has received a multiyear $3.25 million grant to participate as one of the members of the Northeast Regional Center for Excellence in Vector-Borne Diseases.
CDC records show Lyme disease is now the most common “vector-borne disease” in the U.S. Nearly 300,000 people a year are infected with Lyme disease in the U.S., according to federal authorities.
Lyme disease, which was named for the Connecticut shoreline town of Lyme, continues to be the most widespread and prevalent tick-borne diseases in this state.
In 2017, there were 2,022 probable and confirmed cases of Lyme disease in this state.
State reports show the number of Lyme disease cases has fluctuated considerably in recent years: In 2016, there were 1,752 cases; in 2015, probable and confirmed cases numbered 2,553; and in 2014, the state received reports of 2,346 Lyme disease cases.
Gregory B. Hladky can be reached at ghladky@courant.com.
