Tick-borne Lyme Disease and Powassan Virus Could Plague US This Year

Existing notion that ticks die off during winter may not be true if severe winters bring snow, new research shows.

Researchers have found that snow actually acts like a warm blanked to insulate back-legged tick larvae which will surface to cause disease during warm weather. Additionally, humans have to worry about ticks in urban settings and not just in the woods.

"We're finding plenty of infected ticks in built environments, places like city parks, playgrounds, work campuses, college campuses. What makes the problem worse is that people don't perceive of these environments as risky. If they were planning a camping trip, they'd think about how to prevent ticks. But they don't have the same consciousness when they're in town," said Ralph Garruto, at Binghamton University according to CBS News.

Besides transmitting Lyme disease, the ticks can also transmit other diseases and viruses including the rare Powassan virus that causes no symptoms immediately but later causes encephalitis. The disease caused around 49 deaths between 2011 and 2014.

Researchers recently also found in Binghamton area more ticks living in urban settings and nearly a third of them tested for Lyme disease.

However if dry weather ensues later this year, the ticks could die. Last year about 9,000 cases of Lyme disease was reported in the US.