Kids and ticks

I saw that recommendation recently also, 02'. It was one dose of amoxicillin for Lyme disease prophylaxis, if the area has Lyme, etc.

I'm not a parasitologist, but as a veterinarian, I have a lot of training in the area. There's some good advice here, and I'd like to emphasize some, and make a few comments on my own.

In 2016 I took ten hours of continuing education from a former professor of mine, and a leading researcher into vector borne diseases. Learned (and re-learned) some cool stuff.

Ticks attach, but don't imbed their heads or mouth parts in the skin. When you remove a tick, and see something left behind in the skin, it's not part of the tick. It's a cement that the tick uses to attach itself, and this doesn't need to be removed.

After the tick has molted, and prior to onset of feeding, the pathogen level in the gut is very low. This means that when the tick first attaches and begins to feed, the level of pathogen injected with the saliva is very low. The risk of infection is dependent upon the amount of exposure ("dose dependent"). Since the pathogen level increases with continued feeding, the time attached increases risk along with the increase in pathogen production and transmission.

Big however, though: if a tick attaches to you, and it's already been feeding since it's last molt, it's already going to be producing lots of pathogens, and infection can occur pretty quickly.

NEVER try to use any sort of chemical, soap, heat, etc, trying to get the tick to detach. They do vomit, and this just results in the tick injecting a much greater volume of the gut contents into the skin. This also applies to squeezing the tick with your fingers.

Another reason to use tweezers, the tick removal tool, or my favorite, a small pair of hemostats, is that you can avoid touching the tick with your fingers. The pathogens that cause disease reproduce in the gut, and the two sources of infection are the tick's saliva and it's feces. Since the anus is right in the middle of the abdomen, when you squeeze the tick you will get a bunch of tick feces on your skin. Good way to increase the risk of infection. Also, squeezing the tick is another way to cause it to expel it's stomach contents into the skin.

Pinch the tick off parallel to the surface of the skin, without touching it. What you do with it afterwards depends on how much you want to mess with it. Sure, you can put it in a little bottle with some alcohol, burn them, etc. Just don't put them in the trash can, they'll crawl right out. I just wash them down the drain, and leave the water run for a couple of seconds. They won't be back.

I'll finish with this tale, which I've been repeating for a couple of decades. The college of Agriculture at UF had a small frame house, which had been used for three years as a kennel. They moved the dogs out, tent fumigated the building, and sent in a work crew to install dropped ceilings for conversion to office space. When they tore out the original ceiling, there were so many ticks in the attic, they came down the wall in a solid sheet.

The veterinary school had two of the world's best know parasitology specialists on the faculty, so one of them (who told me this story) was requested to assess the situation. His suggestion: "you've got a good slab here, and the fire department will burn it for free." Work aggressively to keep them out of your home!