A Race Against Time: Scientists Aim to Neutralize Escalating Public Health Crisis from Tick-Borne Diseases

In the last half-century, the United States has experienced a significant uptick in diseases transmitted by ticks, necessitating immediate and novel interventions, according to a team of researchers from Yale University. Their review article delineates the gravity of the situation and suggests a range of innovative solutions.

The proposed remedies involve not only a new generation of vaccines for human use, some of which are currently under development at Yale, but also vaccines designed for animals that serve as tick hosts.

The paper has been recently published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

The scientific investigation was spearheaded by Sukanya Narasimhan, an Associate Professor in Yale’s Department of Internal Medicine, specializing in Infectious Diseases, and Erol Fikrig, Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Professor of Medicine, also focused on Infectious Diseases, along with an expertise in epidemiology of microbial diseases and microbial pathogenesis.

Historical Overview and Present State of Affairs

It wasn’t until 1982 that tick-borne diseases came into recognition as a significant public health threat after an outbreak of symptoms resembling arthritis in children in Lyme, Connecticut, was linked to a bacterium transmitted by ticks. Even then, documented instances of such diseases were exceedingly rare.

Today, it is estimated that nearly 490,000 people are infected annually in the United States with tick-borne illnesses such as Lyme disease. Researchers attribute this increase to the resurgence of previously diminished forests and a significant surge in the population of white-tailed deer, a primary host for ticks.

The menace has extended its reach from relatively isolated areas near the New England coast to include the U.S. Midwest and other geographical locations, ever since Lyme disease’s causative agent was identified four decades ago. A particular species of tick, Ixodes scapularis, commonly referred to as the black-legged or deer tick, is responsible for 97% of tick-borne diseases in the country.

Challenges and a Spectrum of Pathogens

The majority of countermeasures against tick-borne diseases have primarily targeted Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacterium responsible for Lyme disease. However, these efforts have shown limited effectiveness and do not address other pathogens transmissible by ticks, according to the researchers.

For instance, deer ticks can also transmit up to six additional human pathogens, including the Powassan virus, which has shown a forty-fold increase in cases over the past two decades and results in severe neurological damage in half of the affected individuals and fatality in 10% of cases.

To address the proliferation of an array of tick-borne diseases, Fikrig’s laboratory at Yale is working on vaccines that disrupt ticks’ ability to feed and even provide an alert mechanism for human hosts when bitten by a tick.

Expansive Vaccine Approaches

Durland Fish, Professor Emeritus of Epidemiology focused on microbial diseases at the Yale School of Public Health and co-author of the paper, advocates for a vaccine that could be administered orally to deer through bait. This would inhibit ticks from feeding on the deer’s blood, thereby reducing both tick populations and human disease risk.

Fish argues that a multidisciplinary approach, akin to the Manhattan Project, is imperative for effectively tackling tick-borne diseases.

Such methodologies have previously been implemented to control rabies in raccoons in the U.S. and foxes in Europe, as well as to safeguard cattle from tick-borne diseases.

In conclusion, the authors emphasize that an integrated One Health approach—balancing the well-being of humans, animals, and ecosystems—will require the collective expertise of molecular biologists, entomologists, ecologists, epidemiologists, physicians, veterinarians, and vaccinologists.

Reference

The article titled “A ticking time bomb hidden in plain sight” by Sukanya Narasimhan, Durland Fish, Joao H. F. Pedra, Utpal Pal, and Erol Fikrig was published on 18 October 2023 in Science Translational Medicine with DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.adi7829.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about Tick-borne Diseases

More about Tick-borne Diseases

• Science Translational Medicine – Link to the original article titled “A ticking time bomb hidden in plain sight” by Sukanya Narasimhan, Durland Fish, Joao H. F. Pedra, Utpal Pal, and Erol Fikrig, published on October 18, 2023, in Science Translational Medicine.
• Yale University Department of Internal Medicine – Visit the department’s official website for more information about the researchers and their work.
• One Health Approach – Learn about the One Health approach, which integrates human, animal, and environmental health to address complex health challenges.