Pritt's lab tests tens of thousands of ticks over the last three years, they've found that more and more of the ticks carry the bacteria that causes anaplasmosis, a disease that can cause headache, fever and chills and severe illness if treatment is delayed. The sheer number of ticks may be forcing them to branch out into new habitats, Mayo Clinic parasitologist Bobbi Pritt theorizes.Īnd, more of them appear to be carrying pathogens. That trend has continued, with ticks are showing up in places previously deemed safe from the disease-carrying arachnids, from those coastal California beach areas to manicured lawns in the Northeast. Now, 'as the numbers expand, we see ticks in areas that we don't think of as traditional habitat,' Pritt says.
