These states are seeing their worst tick activity in nearly 10 years: Data

(NEXSTAR) – Tick activity in the U.S. has reached levels we haven’t seen in nearly 10 years, and data suggest some states are worse off than others.

The CDC previously warned that emergency department visits for tick bites have reached the highest rate in nearly 10 years, while experts have warned we could be in “for a very bad year” when it comes to these pests.

The latest tick bite data from the CDC, updated on Sunday, shows 105 of every 100,000 emergency department visits recorded in April were bite-related. That’s the highest recorded rate for April since 2017 — as far back as the CDC’s publicly available data stretches — when 101 of every 100,000 visits were prompted by tick bites. March tick bites also exceeded those recorded in March 2017 (34 per 100,000 versus 20 per 100,000).

Meanwhile, some regions in the U.S. have also recorded above-average tick activity this year.

Nowhere is that more true than in the Midwest.

In these 10 states — Nebraska, Kansas, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio — 137 out of every 100,000 emergency department visits in April were related to tick bites. That’s just shy of the one-month incident rate record the region saw last May, of 153 per 100,000, and well above the 56 per........

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