The risk of infection from tick bites does not depend on the time of year

At the end of summer and beginning of autumn, a second wave of tick activity is observed. However, as infectious disease doctor Oleg Polubatanov explained to Gazeta.Ru, the risk of contracting infections does not depend on the time of year.

In different regions of Russia, bites are recorded from early spring to late autumn, and the activity of arthropods is directly related to climatic conditions - they need moderate temperatures (from 15 to 25 degrees) and high humidity. The periods of maximum activity occur in May–June and August–September.

However, according to the expert, it is impossible to say that ticks are more dangerous in the fall than in the spring - only their activity changes, and not the level of risk of infection. The statistics of bites is also influenced by people’s behavior: in the spring they go out into nature en masse during the May holidays, and in late summer and early autumn they again increase the number of walks in forested areas.

The superimposition of the biological activity of parasites on the increase in the number of people in forests and parks leads to an increase in the incidence of bites. The actions to take when a tick is detected should be the same at any time of the year: carefully remove it, contact an infectious disease specialist for recommendations on prevention, and monitor your health for a month.