With More People Getting Outside This Summer, Scientists Wonder if Lyme Disease Cases Will Jump

It’s too soon to know exactly how the pandemic will influence Lyme disease cases. But experts speculate that common viral infection symptoms could cause some confusion.

By Jillian Mock
Aug 27, 2020 2:22 PMNov 3, 2020 4:47 PM
shutterstock 342282746
Black-legged ticks transmit Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacterium that causes Lyme disease. (Credit: Steven Ellingson/Shutterstock)

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At the start of field work season, ecologist Jory Brinkerhoff usually advises his crew to watch out for summertime fevers. If you develop a fever at that time of year, he tells them, it’s probably not the flu, but a tick-borne illness.

But this year, Brinkerhoff, who studies human risk for flea- and tick-transmitted diseases at the University of Richmond, didn’t know exactly what to tell his field crew. A fever in the middle of summer 2020 could mean a tick-borne illness. Or, it could mean COVID-19.

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