FORT KNOX, Ky. — Mosquitos! Chiggers! and Ticks, oh my! As we get into the summer months, it’s more and more likely Fort Knox residents will have an encounter with one or all of these pests.
One man who knows a thing or two about them is Fort Knox Public Health chief Dr. James Stephens, and he is itching to share his knowledge with others. He said 2025 is shaping up to be the year of the tick.
~~ticks~~
“We've had more tick bites than I have seen this early in the season. Just since last week, we've pulled over 51 ticks off of people and sent them in for testing,” said Stephens. “If it's the rain that's bringing them out or if it's just their year, or if they came out with the cicadas, I don't know; but they are highly prevalent.”
Stephens said he doesn’t want people to panic about the rash of ticks biting in Central Kentucky, but he also doesn’t want people to be complacent. Though many personnel from military units have been bringing ticks in from the ranges, many more are not.
“A lot of people are saying they're pulling them off and throwing them away and not even bothering with them,” said Stephens. “I don't recommend that because It's always a good idea to find out if they are carriers of diseases.”
With the increase in ticks comes an increase in diseases.
“We've noticed that Lyme disease is getting more prevalent in Kentucky,” said Stephens. “In the past, Lyme disease was not a big concern here, but we have had a 40% increase just in the last year and an almost 100% increase in the last five years of the disease. It's coming to our area.”
The culprit for Lyme disease also happens to be the smallest tick in Kentucky. Called the blacklegged tick or deer tick, it is also the most prevalent. However, it is not the only species to watch out for.
There are actually seven species of ticks in Kentucky, but three of them carry 99% of the diseases that infect humans, according to Stephens: the deer tick, the Lone Star tick, which has a white dot on the back, and the American dog tick.
“The other diseases that we have are Rocky Mountain spotted fever, ehrlichiosis and of course the dreaded alpha gal, which is the red meat allergy,” said Stephens. “That one, really nobody wants. Everybody's more scared of that than they are of Lyme disease and Rocky Mountain spotted fever.”
Stephens explained that alpha gal is particularly sinister for another reason.
“I can treat all the other diseases with antibiotics,” said Stephens. “I cannot treat an allergy.”
The Lone Star tick is the typical carrier of alpha gal, although Stephens said any tick can carry any of the diseases, the most life-threatening being Lyme disease and ehrlichiosis, which affect the entire body.
Stephens warns against assuming that a bullseye rash will indicate the presence of Lyme.
“Everybody thinks about the bullseye rash. That doesn't always have to appear,” said Stephens. “So just because it doesn't have a bullseye rash doesn't mean you don't have a disease. Joints, pains, fevers, chills, body aches, nausea, vomiting, even a sore throat can all come from those diseases.”
Stephens said doctors should be made aware of tick bites if somebody starts suffering these symptoms. Patients should also not assume a prophylactic will cure them of all diseases from a tick bite.
“For Lyme disease, it is what you take to keep from getting it,” said Stephens. “With ehrlichiosis, a prophylactic medicine is only a partial treatment. It will put the disease to sleep for a time and you’ll think it’s gone, but then when it comes back it's worse than it was in the beginning.”
~~tick myths~~
A common belief is that people should burn the tick and cause it to back out from the heat.
“When you burn the tick, what you're doing is making it throw up inside of you,” said Stephens.
Another removal technique is to pinch the tick’s back and pull it off.
“Don’t pull it out by the body,” said Stephens. “When you do that, you're actually squeezing all the disease into you.”
His recommendation: use tweezers and grab the tick at the lowest possible point on the tick, against the skin, to pull it out. That’s where the head is located.
~~chiggers~~
Stephens said chiggers are basically harmless by comparison to ticks.
“Ticks are bad, but chiggers are the most annoying things,” said Stephens. “They do love to get inside. They do love to burrow. They do love to lay eggs, and they itch and itch and itch.
“The chiggers themselves don’t really carry disease.”
The problems come when people don’t treat the itching and end up scratching infections into their skin.
“You break the skin and cause a secondary infection,” said Stephens. “So staph infections and others are very common.”
While chiggers are considered the least harmful of the three biters, people still try various methods to rid themselves of the tiny red invaders.
Some of the more common methods include putting nail polish on the bumps, or gas – neither of which works.
~~mosquitoes~~
Stephens said mosquito numbers have been relatively average this year, so far.
“We haven’t seen a great influx of numbers,” said Stephens. “They are out more just because there's been more water with all the rain that we've had. And they are out earlier because they've had a lot more places to lay eggs. That's what we're looking at.”
As for diseases, Stephens said the United States typically doesn’t see the kinds of mosquito-born illnesses that countries in South America or Southeast Asia encounter. However—
“Mosquitoes do carry diseases, and in Kentucky they carry Zika, West Nile, and one called La Crosse that nobody ever hears about because a lot of people don’t end up experiencing symptoms.”
Stephens said there have only been three cases of West Nile reported in Kentucky the past few years. The same with encephalitis, which only affected horses.
The biggest problem with mosquitoes again involves itching.
Prevention is the key to avoiding all three biters and, according to Stephens, one size fits all three.
“The best first aid is to wear long pants, long shirts, socks; close-toed shoes. That is your first barrier,” said Stephens. “The second barrier is bug spray. Try to spray around those areas where the critters like to come in.”
For ticks, those areas involve the ankles and feet, the waistline, sleeves and the neck. For mosquitoes, all exposed areas are fair game.
Stephens warns to consider also protecting and treating pets.
“Pets can get these same diseases: Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever and ehrlichiosis,” said Stephens, “but when dogs get these diseases, they can't tell us their joints ache. They can't tell us they have fevers, and many times we don't find out they have the diseases until it's too late.”
Stephens’ last piece of advice: bring the ticks in to Public Health at Margetis Clinic when you pull them off. He doesn’t care how the tick is delivered to them, although most people put them in plastic baggies.
“We will send it off, and we will see if there is a disease associated with it. If it does have a disease, that doesn't mean we have to treat the person immediately. It's just we at least have something to watch out for.”
Whether you’re bit by mosquitoes, chiggers or ticks, or other little biters, Stephens said the Public Health personnel are there for you.
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