Unusually aggressive lone star ticks, common in the south-east, are spreading to areas previously too cold for them

    • @[email protected]
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      7 days ago

      Yeah, Lyme Disease can potentially cause that. It’s weird they’re saying “meat allergy” and not lyme disease, but lyme is pretty bad and can cause lifelong complications (post-treatment lyme disease syndrome)

      Edit: guess I’m wrong

      • @[email protected]
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        537 days ago

        The lone star tick actually usually does not carry Lyme, you are thinking of deer ticks. This is an entirely different condition that is caused by an allergic reaction to the lone star ticks saliva which your body confuses with carbohydrates found in most mammalian meats leading to a long term meat allergy.

        • @[email protected]
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          137 days ago

          Maybe its Mother Nature way of making us stop consuming beef and all become vegan? I mean nature finds a way. The cattle industry is a huge contributor to climate change, so maybe this is a good thing.

          Of course if this was to affect everyone, you see how quickly the government would fund a cure. Interesting novel idea…going give that a think.

          • @[email protected]
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            127 days ago

            It wouldnt be pushing people to veganism, considering there are plenty of animal products you could consume even if youre allergic to meat.

            Also there are a lot more types of meat than beef. I eat meat often and hardly ever eat any beef

            • @[email protected]
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              87 days ago

              Not, entirely correct. Alpha-gal syndrome is not a meat allergy. Gelatin, Glycerin and Magnesium stearate all contain high levels of it and are found in products as diverse as makeup, candy, shampoo, vape juice, energy drinks and toothpaste. High levels of alpha-gal are found in Milk and Milk products. All mammalian meat, organ meat, lipids and derived products. You check labels for the rest of your life if you have this and you’ll probably still come into contact with it out in the wild. You get Fish, Eggs and poultry. That’s only guaranteed if you buy the meat on its own, free from seasoning and cross-contamination. You don’t eat in a restaurant anymore, unless it’s sushi.

              • @[email protected]
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                87 days ago

                My wife has had to follow a low FODMAP and gluten free diet for the last 6ish years. It’s miserable and I wouldn’t wish such a vast allergy as this on anyone. I know there are plenty of haughty taughty vegans in this thread making jest, but these kinds of allergies fucking suck and I guarantee vegans consume shit that has these compounds without even realizing, since like you said, it exists in far more than just basic meat-based foods.

            • @[email protected]
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              37 days ago

              Oh I think that a solid theory. Maybe why we are busy killing ourselves off. Maybe Gaia knows us humans are the major problem with all the shit going on and wired us to kill ourselves off.

              • DominusOfMegadeus
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                27 days ago

                We’re wired to kill ourselves off. She’s just sick of us fucking up the environment with industrial farming methods.

            • @[email protected]
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              27 days ago

              Add in birdflu and man we could see a new era of man kind all being vegetarian. Btw I was working on a novel that contains birdflu and found a way to incorporate this into it.

      • @[email protected]
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        467 days ago

        They don’t refer to it as Lyme because it’s a different issue. It just happens to also be spread by ticks. Lyme disease and Alpha-gal Syndrome are different things but are sometimes comorbities since both are commonly spread by ticks.

      • ORbituary
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        87 days ago

        If you bothered to read the article, you’d have known this was Alpa-gal Syndrome, not Lyme.

      • @[email protected]
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        27 days ago

        lyme is caused by deer ticks and its a bacterial spirochetes, theres actually a whole cult against chronic lyme which is a pseudoscientific belief thats incurable.

    • @[email protected]
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      237 days ago

      Not only the environment, the overall Americans health too. Each year, 700 000 Americans are dying from heart diseases.

    • @[email protected]
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      737 days ago

      After reading the article I hope they seek out and bite Donald Trump. Wouldn’t that be hilarious if this caused him a meat allergy?

      • @[email protected]
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        427 days ago

        Yeah, but all ticks can do that. The “meat allergy ones” are a species that is only moving now because of climate change, which in no small part is also caused by emissions from factory farming.

    • DominusOfMegadeus
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      487 days ago

      Honestly, I feel like this is a big fuck you from mother nature, telling us that our industrial farming practices, that are contributing so heavily to climate change, are now worth fuck all. And I am very much not a vegan.

      • @[email protected]
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        167 days ago

        Bruh, I see more meat-eaters following and actively commenting on vegan pages and forums than vegans being annoying lol

        • @[email protected]
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          56 days ago

          Can confirm IRL, too. I’m not vegan, but vegetarian. Cannot tell you how many rather stupid conversations I’ve had (initiated by omnivores that discover I’m vegetarian, which I don’t exactly advertise, but obviously there are times it comes up if you are sharing a meal at work, or with friends/relatives and so on).

          That’s even with me not really having any desire to proselytize or anything. It’d be one thing if I was upping the ante in response. But there is a certain kind of omnivore that seem to be deeply triggered by the existence of veg*ns. I mean, it really really seems to bother them.

  • @[email protected]
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    387 days ago

    The syndrome is not caused by a pathogen but spurs an allergy to a sugar molecule found in mammals and an array of other things, from toothpaste to medical equipment.

    Lone star ticks are aggressive and can speedily follow a human target if they detect them. “They will hunt you, they are like a cross between a lentil and a velociraptor,” said Sharon Pitcairn Forsyth, a conservationist who lives in the Washington DC area.

    A particular horror is the prospect of brushing up against vegetation containing a massed ball of juvenile lone star ticks, know as a “tick bomb”, that can deliver thousands of tick bites. “They are so tiny you can’t see them but you have to take it seriously or you’ll never get them off you,” said Forsyth, who now carries around a lint roller to remove such clusters.

    • @[email protected]
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      287 days ago

      Many years ago my dog brought in a tic bomb, and got into bed with me. I awoke to my left arm and hand covered in so many sesema seed sized tics I could not even see my skin.

      It took hours to get them off me and my dog.

      I dodged a bullet cause I didn’t get any illnesses, nor did my dog.

      I’m still freaked out though.

  • Dammam No. 7
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    56 days ago

    Meat production is a major contributor to climate change. This is almost as if nature is acting in self defense.

    • @[email protected]
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      96 days ago

      We’ll convert the bloodmouths, one way or another! The next plan is mosquitoes that make you allergic to cheese.

    • NιƙƙιDιɱҽʂ
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      6 days ago

      The condition, known as alpha-gal syndrome, has proliferated from just a few dozen known cases in 2009 to as many as 450,000 now.
      Alpha-gal (galactose-alpha-1,3-galactose) is a sugar molecule found in the cells of all mammals except humans and some primates

      Well, at least we can still eat each other, it seems. The rich be lookin’ mighty tasty as of late…

  • @[email protected]
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    106 days ago

    Every time I go hiking with my dog I pull one of these little bastards off his fur. I cover him in permethrin, as well as every inch of my clothing, shoes and hat, so I’m not SUPER stressed about it, but it’s still annoying. A couple days ago I found one in his tail floof (he’s a golden so it’s a giant poof.) The tick was near dead already by the time I got it untangled from his fur thanks to the permethrin though. Usually I spot the ticks on him either because they’re on his head (where they’re easy to spot immediately), or because they got tangled in his fur and couldn’t jump off. I’ve never once seen one bite him thankfully.

    It’s wild to me because I have only seen other kinds of ticks twice so far this season, but otherwise it’s all lone star ticks, which are not supposed to be the most common where I am. They’re definitely more prominent this year though. Of all the tick diseases, alpha-gal terrifies me the most, so I’m not thrilled by this increase in lone stars.

  • @[email protected]
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    167 days ago

    I know in Arkansas a ton of people have been getting this. I knew a guy that lost nearly 100 pounds after getting it. His diet really changes.

      • @[email protected]
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        117 days ago

        That’s actually extremely common. Belgian fries (the original French fries) are originally cooked in beef fat. But nowadays it’s often a beef/plant based fat mix instead. It’s actually quite hard to find vegan fries in Belgium.

      • @[email protected]
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        57 days ago

        The alt right health grifter sphere is currently obsessed with the evils of “seed oils.” Tallow is supposed to be magically better for you.

        A couple of steps away from the raw milk drinkers and the “rebel canners.”

  • @[email protected]
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    77 days ago

    I am hoping to take a vaccine that can kill them dead, or least take care of their parasites. As a guy who likes steaks, hot dogs, and juicy burgers, these ticks are abominations.

    Oh, and the Wall of Flesh that prevents screwflys from spreading through the neck of Panama has started to fail. You and your pets will likely have your flesh being eaten.

    What a wonderful time to live on the American continent. 🤕

    • @[email protected]
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      16 days ago

      Don’t worry, if someone tries to make that a reality RFK will just say that it’s a nanochip tracking super austism biological weapon shot that kills you a year later and nuke the program.

  • @[email protected]
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    177 days ago

    One time I saw a lone star tick crawl into the headphone jack of my phone.

    I tried everything I could think of to get it out, to no avail. Then I googled two things:

    • What eats ticks?

    • Guinea hen mating sounds

    After fifteen seconds of guinea hen sounds, I watched the tick crawl out of my phone… and immediately disappear.

    • @[email protected]
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      97 days ago

      Oh buddy, you should have killed it. ☹️ Stomped it out. Not only is there the meat allergy thing, but idk, they can probably still carry Lyme Disease & that’s a real bitch.

      • @[email protected]
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        76 days ago

        Do you have experience with ticks? You can’t stomp them. They’re too small and flat with hard shells and don’t squish. They have to be cut in half, burned, or drowned. Some people can kill them with their fingernails, but mine are too short.

        I found two of them on my body later that night and killed them with tweezers. Or fire, I don’t remember which.

        Also, deer ticks carry Lyme disease, not lone star ticks.

  • m-p{3}
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    7 days ago

    My wife would be fucked unless this take out some preexisting allergies she has (quinoa, buckwheat, hazelnuts, peanuts, eggs and many legumes including soybeans although she doesn’t react to soy lecithin)

    • @[email protected]
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      87 days ago

      I have a soy allergy too and don’t react to lecithin. My understanding is that by the time the soy is processed into lecithin, the “thing” you’re allergic to is pretty much non-existent and that’s why you don’t react to it.

      This isn’t the case for all people who are allergic to soy. This is not medical advice.

      • @[email protected]
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        7 days ago

        Thirding this. I develop a rash even after coming into contact with something that had soybean oil on it, but lecithin is safe (for me).

      • HubertManne
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        17 days ago

        My dog is alergic to a crazy amount of things and eats hydrolyzed food which apparently changes the proteins enough to not react to it.

  • @[email protected]
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    367 days ago

    Funny, humanity contributing to the reduction of the climate crisis by increasing the number of ticks causing people to become allergic to meat, meaning less demand for meat, meaning less greenhouse gases being released into the atmosphere as cattle becomes less profitable.