Dear Dr. Gott: I'm a 70-year-old female. When I was a child in a
small town in Maryland, I can remember every spring having to go and
get a dreaded tick shot. I never remember getting a tick on me. Now
I live in Virginia. I take ticks off me every day in the season for
them, but no one ever mentions those dreaded tick shots. I don't
hear of anyone dying of tick fever anymore. Are ticks not as
dangerous these days?
Dear Reader: Colorado tick fever is an acute viral infection
that is transmitted through the bite of an infected wood tick and
should not be confused with the bacteria tick-borne Rocky Mountain
spotted fever. There is also the possibility of dogs picking up
infected wood ticks and transmitting the disease. Symptoms are
similar to those of a cold: fever, chills, aches and pains. A
vaccine was created for Colorado tick fever but was never
manufactured.
If you are referring to the tick-borne Lyme disease, this was
discovered only about 35 years ago, in 1975, and was named after a
small town in Connecticut. This infectious disease is caused by a
spirochete that thrives in deer ticks. It is spread to humans by a
tick bite.
A vaccine to treat Lyme was developed, but production stopped in
2002 because of low demand, so it is no longer available to humans.
The three-dose vaccine was geared toward people between the ages of
15 and 70 who resided in endemic areas of the northeastern and north
central United States. This translated to the duration of immunity
and need for any booster shots beyond the third dose to remain
unknown. For a time several years ago, I immunized patients who
insisted on receiving the course of treatment. Some experienced such
unpleasant side effects following the first or second dose that they
finally (and thankfully) refused to continue.
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