Ticks: why they are dangerous, how to protect yourself from ticks and provide assistance if bitten. How to protect yourself from ticks How to protect yourself from ticks in the city

With the arrival of spring, the season of picnics and nature hikes opens. The period from April to June is the most optimal for outdoor recreation, but this time is also considered the most dangerous, since ticks appear with the first warm rays of the sun. They live in deciduous and coniferous forests, in park areas of cities, as well as in summer cottages, so when going for a walk, you need to remember the danger that awaits you.

How dangerous are ticks?

A tick is a small insect that is one of the bloodsuckers. It gets on the body and sticks to the skin completely painlessly, so it can be very difficult to detect it right away.

Most ticks are carriers of various diseases, including very dangerous ones. These include tick-borne encephalitis, borrelia, tick-borne rickettsiosis, monocytic ehrlichiosis and many others.

After a tick bite, it will take a little time until the infection in its saliva spreads throughout the body. Symptoms can be very different and appear at different times.

If you feel dizziness, fever, nausea, headache, vomiting, numbness in the limbs, muscle pain, cramps or movement disorders, immediately examine your body to see if it is due to a tick. If you do not seek help in time, the consequences of a tick bite can be very disastrous, even fatal.

How to protect yourself from ticks

When going for a walk in places where ticks live, you need to take all possible measures to prevent them from getting on your body. The first thing to do is to choose the appropriate clothes.

As you know, ticks stick to the softest areas of the body, namely in the area under the knees, on the bends of the arms, in the groin, in the armpits, on the neck and on the head. Make sure that all the listed places are tightly closed, wear long pants, tuck them into shoes, which should also be as closed as possible, and be sure to wear hats.

It takes about 30 minutes for a tick to reach a suitable location and penetrate the skin, so inspect your body every 20 minutes. Ticks live in grass and bushes, so when they get on a person, they crawl upward.

Don't forget about additional precautions. There are a large number of special chemicals in the form of aerosols and sprays that repel ticks or kill them. Before using the product, be sure to read the instructions for its use.

What should I do if bitten by a tick?

If you still failed to protect yourself from a tick bite and you find it on your body, get rid of it as soon as possible by taking appropriate measures.

There is an opinion that it is necessary to drop oil on it, thus blocking the oxygen, due to which the tick will crawl out on its own. This is an erroneous statement, since when exposed to oil or any other liquid, the tick will only go deeper under the skin.

You can pull it out with tweezers or using ordinary thread. Make a loop out of the thread, put it on the tick as close to the body as possible, tighten the loop and, making circular movements counterclockwise, carefully pull the tick out. If the tick is not completely pulled out, and part of its body remains under the skin, it must be removed using a needle. After removing the tick, it is advisable to save it to show it to the doctor, whom you should go to for examination at the first opportunity.

Ekaterina Makhnonosova

The warm period has begun, a period of vacations and trips to the country or out of town. Whenever possible, we try to get out of the noisy city and relax in nature. We have picnics on the grass in the shade of the trees, go into the forest to breathe fresh air, enjoy eating fruits and vegetables, bask in the rays of the June sun, sunbathe and forget about everything in the world. Meanwhile, it is necessary to remember that when communicating with nature, it is not surprising to “pick up” a small, sneaky enemy called a tick; By the way, it can be life-threatening.

Ticks are most aggressive after hibernation - in April-June, and then in September-November. Ticks can be carriers of dangerous viruses - hemorrhagic fever and tick-borne encephalitis.

There are dozens of species of ticks, but only a few species carry diseases. According to statistics, 2-2.5% of ticks are infectious, the rest are practically safe. For example, for every two thousand people bitten by ticks, about 10 people become ill.

Ticks can be found on plants at a height of one meter and “jump” onto passing people or animals. Insects are very active - they are able to chase a walking person at a distance of 100-150 meters. Therefore, representatives of the so-called risk group - people working in the forest, receive vaccinations that serve as prophylaxis against viral encephalitis transmitted by ticks. How can other people protect themselves from ticks, since there are dangerous insects not only in the forest, but also in the park, on the city alley? In order to avoid disaster, you need to take basic precautions:

You should dress in light-colored clothing: it is easy to spot ticks on them. Tie the edges of your sleeves and trousers tightly, and when in the forest, inspect yourself every two to three hours and do not sit down to rest under the bushes. If you find a crawling insect on your clothing, you must carefully remove it and, preferably, place it in a closed glass container, then take it to the sanitary and epidemiological station. There, experts will determine exactly how dangerous a given tick is and whether it can cause the development of a dangerous infection such as tick-borne encephalitis.

If the tick has already drunk blood, you need to take it to the laboratory as quickly as possible to determine whether it is a carrier of a dangerous disease. The victim may need to be given a protective vaccine immediately.

After a tick bite, you may experience high fever, nausea, headache, and dizziness. If these signs occur, you should immediately consult a doctor. Viral encephalitis appears on average after 21 days, but can be detected after six months. A tick bite cannot be ignored: some people’s bodies do not produce an antidote to the “tick-borne” virus.

You can also become infected with encephalitis through products of animal origin, primarily after consuming raw milk. Goats and cows, eating grass, chew ticks and themselves carry the disease almost unnoticeably, but the milk contains the virus. It happened that ticks were brought home in a bouquet of forest flowers...

You need to know that there are protective chemicals, so-called repellents, that repel insects. These substances can be lubricated on exposed areas of the body and soaked into clothing.

HOW TO REMOVE A TICK

This is great stupidity,” says Vladimir Nikiforov, head of the department of infectious diseases at the Institute of Advanced Studies of the FMBA of Russia, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor. - The tick does not breathe with its head, but with its “butt”, where the spiracles are located. But the causative agent of infection is in the bloodsucker’s saliva, which it immediately begins to pump into the wound. And the longer this little vampire drinks blood, the greater the dose of infection he will transmit. The tick gradually digs into the skin more and more strongly: it pushes the skin tissues apart, attaching itself to them - there is a cementing substance in the saliva. Therefore, you need to pull it out immediately, wrapping it around the body with thread or grabbing it with gauze, tongs or tweezers and carefully twisting it. When removing a tick, be careful not to crush it, and wash your hands immediately afterwards.

It is advisable not to destroy the remains of the tick, but to submit it to the laboratory for examination. They will tell you whether it was contagious and whether treatment needs to be started. Until then, there’s no need to be too nervous. The bite of only 5% of ticks causes encephalitis, but in Siberia and the Urals there are more of them. And tick-borne encephalitis does not always end in paralysis, paresis, or meningitis. In about half of the cases, everything gets by with “little blood”: fever, intoxication, sore throat - something like the flu. With a tick bite, you are much more likely to catch another infection - Lyme disease (tick-borne borreliosis). “Lyme” ticks in the population can be up to 30%. The first sign of the disease is a reddish-purple spot spreading from the point of the bite, lighter in the middle and swollen at the edges. In the early stages, the disease can be successfully treated with special antibiotics. If you realize it a year later, the patient will almost certainly become chronically ill.

TICK VACCINATION

However, there are no absolutely innocent ticks. The saliva that a tick (even an uninfected one) pumps into the wound so that the blood does not clot and there is no pain can cause severe allergies, including bronchial asthma. There is a vaccine for tick-borne encephalitis, but it is too late to get vaccinated now. A total of three vaccinations are given over the course of a year, and this provides 99% protection.

When going into the forest, wear light, plain clothes - it is easier to spot ticks on them. Tuck your shirt into your trousers, and your trousers into your socks or thick boots. It is better to choose a shirt and trousers with zippers. On the head - a hood or a thick scarf.

Check yourself every 10-15 minutes. The tick looks like a brown-red bug, hungry - only 2-3 mm in size, ate - up to 10-15 mm. The tick does not attach itself immediately; after clinging to clothing, it always crawls upward in search of a place for a “meal.”

For parking or spending the night in the forest, choose areas where there is no tall grass, with sandy soils and pine trees. Ticks, contrary to another popular belief, never fall from a tree onto your head or rise to a height of more than a meter.

Use sprays and pencils that kill and repel ticks. It is recommended to apply circular stripes around the ankles, knees, hips, waist, cuffs and always around the collar.

Don't drink raw goat's milk. A goat bitten by an encephalitis tick becomes infected. Boiling kills the virus.

Do not immediately bring a bouquet of wildflowers into the house, leave it in the sun for a while - ticks do not like direct sunlight.

So called " encephalitis ticks" - these are ticks of the ixodid family, which are found in forests, meadows, pastures on the territory of Ukraine, and in the last decade, under conditions of intensive urbanization processes, they have moved to park recreation areas of cities, squares and front gardens.

Ticks are carriers of pathogens of viral, rickettsial, bacterial diseases of humans and animals. In the conditions of Kyiv, they spread ixodid tick-borne boreliosis among people, piroplasmosis among dogs; in the conditions of Ukraine - also tick-borne encephalitis, tularemia, etc. The pathogens of these diseases are not transmitted from a sick person to a healthy person.

Most often, ticks attach to a person's clothing when it touches tree branches, bushes, or when a person sits on the grass. Ticks stick to people’s bodies not only while they are in nature, but also some time later after visiting the green area, remaining on clothes and things. In addition, they can be brought into a person’s home with bouquets of flowers, dogs, and other animals.

The body of the tick is oval-flattened, narrowed in front. Adult ticks and nymphs (immature form) have four pairs of limbs with claws and special suckers. The male tick has a dorsal shield; on the female’s body it is located near the main part in a semi-oval shape.

A tick bite is painless, since, together with saliva, it introduces an anesthetic substance into the wound and only after a few hours does a feeling of pain arise.

Usually adult ticks that have attached themselves are detected by humans in 2-3 days: appears here swelling, itching, redness. The suction of a small, almost transparent nymph often remains unnoticed by humans.

How to protect yourself from ticks:

When visiting places where ticks may be present, it is recommended to dress in light, plain, long-sleeved clothing that fits tightly to the body to make it easier to spot crawling ticks. The head should be covered with a hat.

Self-examinations should be carried out while walking through every 2 hours and again at home. In particular, you need to carefully examine areas of the body covered with hair.

A place to rest and sleep at night in nature is necessary free from dry grass, branches, brushwood within a radius of 20-25 meters.

Should go home immediately change clothes, underwear, carefully inspect them, wash and iron them. You should not leave these clothes near the bed or sleep in them. Shaking out clothes will not rid them of ticks.

Tick-borne encephalitis is natural acute infectious viral disease with predominant damage to the central nervous system, which can lead to disability, sometimes even death.

The tick is a carrier of infectious diseases; in terms of the number of transmitted infections it ranks second after the mosquito (22 bacterial, 3 viral and several protozoal). There are a lot of ticks in nature, but not all of them are capable of causing harm to humans.

A viral infection that affects the central and peripheral nervous system, tick-borne encephalitis, is carried by ixodid ticks. Severe complications of this acute infection can lead to disability, paralysis and death.

What should you pay attention to after a tick bite or if you suspect a bite if you did not find a tick on your body? Local signs: inflammation on the skin at the site of the bite, redness in the form of a ring that is steadily expanding. Itching and rawness appear only after 6-12 hours, or even later.

The disease itself begins acutely, accompanied by chills, severe headache, a sharp rise in temperature to 38-39 degrees, nausea, vomiting, and muscle pain. The back, neck and lower back are mainly affected.

Removing the tick

What to do if you find a tick attached to your body? It must be removed as soon as possible. It is advisable to immediately contact any regional 24-hour trauma center. If this is not possible, then the tick will have to be removed yourself. Remember that lubricating the bite site and the tick itself with ointment, kerosene or sunflower oil is useless.

The removed tick must be preserved to be examined for tick-borne infections. To do this, place the extracted tick in a glass bottle along with a piece of cotton wool, slightly moistened with water, and close the lid tightly. For microscopic diagnosis, it must be delivered to the laboratory alive.
If the results of the study reveal that the tick was infected, the victim is injected with immunoglobulin against tick-borne encephalitis. Its administration is effective only within 92 hours after the bite. Later it is useless.

If you are bitten by a tick, it is better to go to city emergency rooms.

Routes of infection

Anyone can become infected with tick-borne encephalitis, even those who do not travel outdoors. Ticks attack not only outside the city, but also in city gardens and parks. True, neither in parks nor in forests do ticks rise to a height above 75 cm, so stories about how they “jump” from trees should be treated as a myth.
Remember that branches, bouquets, and brooms brought from the forest may contain ticks; after a walk, your animals may bring them into the house.

The peak of tick activity and, accordingly, infection with infectious diseases in Russia occurs in May-June. They are most aggressive on warm days from 8 to 11 am and from 5 to 8 pm. With the onset of heat or during rain, they are little active.

How to protect yourself from ticks?

There are several ways of contracting tick-borne encephalitis. Depending on them, preventive measures are taken.

The natural way is through a tick bite, which is practically not felt because it secretes an anesthetic substance. Transmission of the virus can occur in the first minutes of tick suction to a person and during blood sucking. Therefore, when going for a walk in the forest, make sure that your clothes protect your body as much as possible from crawling ticks. The collar of the shirt should fit snugly to the neck and the sleeves to the wrists. The shirt is tucked into the pants, the ends of the pants are tucked into socks and boots. It is advisable that the fabric of the clothing be lint-free. Be sure to put a hood, cap or scarf on your head.

Use deterrents - repellents that are used to treat exposed areas of the body and clothing. Particular care should be taken to treat areas where ticks crawl - sleeve cuffs, collars, ends of trousers. Choose clothes in light colors - ticks are more visible on them.

How to protect yourself from tick bites in nature? While walking, regularly inspect yourself and your companions - they should also inspect you, shake off any ticks they find. Carry out a detailed inspection at home. Pay special attention to the neck, armpits, groin area, and ears. In these places the skin is delicate and thin, so the tick likes to attach itself there.

Places for halts and night sleep in nature must be cleared of dry grass, branches, brushwood within a radius of 20-25 meters. You can make a "circle" on the ground or around your tent using repellent spray.

The next route of infection is nutritional, that is, through food, goat or cow's milk of infected animals. The milk of infected goats takes on a pinkish tint. By the way, not only raw milk is contagious, but also products made from it: cheese, cottage cheese, sour cream. So you should not drink raw milk (it is better to boil it) and do not buy questionable dairy products.

The contact path is possible if you crush the tick with your hands, and there are microcracks on them. Therefore, when detecting and removing a tick, try to save it entirely.

Specific prevention

These are preventive vaccinations against tick-borne encephalitis, emergency seroprophylaxis with specific immunoglobulin, treatment of areas of natural foci of tick-borne encephalitis, clearing of suburban forests, promotion of methods and means of personal protection against tick bites.

Vaccination is mandatory for risk groups, which include those whose activities involve staying in the forest - foresters, geologists, builders, hunters, employees of country health institutions, tourists. The risk group also includes summer residents and children who go to health camps for the summer. They should also take care of vaccinations.

Routine vaccination is carried out according to the scheme and includes three vaccinations. The first is held on the selected day. The second - after 1-7 months. The third is revaccination after 12 months. It is necessary to complete the entire vaccination course 2 weeks before leaving for an area unfavorable for tick-borne encephalitis. Vaccination is the most reliable protection against tick-borne encephalitis.