Canada

Making a vaccine for lyme disease available will help immensely—I believe there's one in clinical trials south of the border.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

Lyme disease is the most familiar — and by far the most common — but there's growing concern about lesser-known threats as well, from various bacterial infections, to the rare Powassan virus that claimed Harris's life earlier this year.

"We are seeing a lot more victims, especially in those high-tick areas, specifically if you're looking at Ontario, Quebec, and Nova Scotia," said Heather Coatsworth, one of the Public Health Agency of Canada's (PHAC) top tick experts, in an interview with CBC News.

As for Powassan — named after the Ontario town where it was first discovered in a young boy who died of his illness back in 1958 — infections remain rare and localized to certain regions, Coatsworth noted.

New U.S. surveillance data, published in the journal Clinical Microbiology and Infection in June, also shows a four-fold spike in the number of American cases, partially thanks to the broader spread of the black-legged ticks that carry both Powassan and Lyme.

"Climate change is the main driver," Coatsworth said, noting that the increased range of ticks means these various health threats are now appearing in more animal species and urban, downtown areas.

Ottawa-area resident Mary Raths considers herself lucky for getting a prompt anaplasmosis diagnosis and treatment when she fell ill with a headache, nausea, and fever, not long after a camping trip in 2021.

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