In 2019, 560 of the 658 ticks collected from individuals in New Brunswick were removed from hosts which had no recent (previous two weeks) travel out-of-province. Of these 560 ticks, 452 were Ixodes scapularis.
Figure 2: Numbers of Ixodes scapularis returned from each of the seven New Brunswick Health Regions. Data presented includes only the 452 Ixodes scapularis ticks which were removed from hosts in New Brunswick that had no recent travel out-of-province.
Out of 452 New Brunswick Ixodes scapularis (excluding those with recent out-of-province travel), 75 (16.6%) were positively identified for the presence of Borrelia burgdorferi, through testing with the MTA Tick Lab's nested PCR protocol.
Latin names and laboratory terms
Ixodes scapularis = Blacklegged tick, main vector for the causative agent of Lyme disease
Ixodes cookei = Groundhog tick
Ixodes marxi = Squirrel tick
Ixodes spp. = Any species of the genus Ixodes (species unidentifiable)
Amblyomma americanum = Lonestar tick
Dermacentor variabilis = American dog tick
Haemaphysalis leporispalustris = Rabbit tick
Unidentifiable = Cannot be accurately identified (usually damaged or decomposed)
Borrelia burgdorferi = Bacteria, causative agent of Lyme disease, spread by the bite of infected Ixodes scapularis
"n" = sample size
Species composition = A quantitative measure of how the population or sample is composed of various species
Host = The human or animal the tick was feeding on / removed from
All content copyright, images and data by Dr. Vett K. Lloyd and Mount Allison University