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Huge increase of ticks reported in Spain

By Chris King • Published: 05 Aug 2021 • 18:11

HUGE increase of ticks all over Spain according to the National Association of Environmental Health Companies

According to Milagros Fernandez de Lezeta, the president of the National Association of Environmental Health Companies (ANECPLA)in Spain, “the number of people who go to medical care centres with tick bites has skyrocketed”, so they are asking for extreme attention to prevent these small animals from biting us and transmitting serious diseases.

Ticks are usually found in areas with a lot of vegetation, and when a warm-blooded animal, or human, passes by, they land on their skin and at the same time exhale an anesthetic which means you don’t feel them, then they stay stuck to the skin and proceed to suck the blood that they need to survive.

There are many diseases that ticks can spread by attaching themselves to you, the most serious are: Crimean-Congo hemorrhage fever, Lyme disease or viral encephalitis, with nine people having contracted the Crimean-Congo disease in Spain since 2013, with three of them dying, with the president of ANECPLA saying, “It is difficult for a tick to transmit a disease to us, but once it transmits a disease such as the Crimean-Congo, the mortality rate is very high, up to 30 per cent”, adding, “as a reference in terms of percentage of mortality, Covid is between 0.5 per cent and 1 per cent”.
To combat this huge increase of ticks you can buy tick repellent sprays of course, but you should, “also avoid going through areas of more vegetation when out walking in the countryside”, adds Fernandez de Lezeta, and to take care with pets, and check them when you return home, as they often collect ticks after passing through vegetation, “It is important to look at their ears and armpits; in all those areas that are hotter, because that is where the ticks will be”.
“When someone is bitten by a tick, you have to be careful with the extraction, because sometimes it is thought to have been removed, but the oral apparatus still remains inside, which causes infections”, but if you can not get to a medical centre then use tweezers to remove the tick, “take the head of the tick and pull it upwards, to remove it, but, it is important to take the tick to a centre, so that they can analyse the microorganisms and parasites that it may have, and thus know if we have been infected with any important disease”, concluded Fernandez de Lezeta, as reported by 20minutos.es.

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Written by

Chris King

Originally from Wales, Chris spent years on the Costa del Sol before moving to the Algarve where he is a web reporter for The Euro Weekly News covering international and Spanish national news. Got a news story you want to share? Then get in touch at editorial@euroweeklynews.com

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