The Man Who Removes Ticks

David Trammel's picture

Climate change is going to change more than just the environment, its going to change the ways we socially interact.

Climate Change Enters Its Blood-Sucking Phase

Reading the article gives me a chill, thinking of myself in the wilderness and a bunch of ticks attached to the place in my back I can't get to, slowly sucking the blood from me. If this kind of infestation becomes a reality of life then I can see some major story ideas.

The first goes along with the title of this thread, a person much like a dentist or barber, in a post collapse town, who for a small fee safely removes ticks that get into our skin.

Second, I can see social interactions where bands of adventurers check each other, either after a night's sleep or after a journey through heavily brushed areas, and also checking their horses and livestock too.

Perhaps something a subtle as sleeping in hammocks with a outward facing cone of waxed paper on the ropes that support the hammock to prevent ticks from climbing down and biting us.

What other social changes can you imagine if we didn't just have to worry about a trip to the woods but our day to day life?

Justin Patrick Moore's picture

Thanks for posting this! Here are a few thoughts.

Certainly the resurgence of bed bugs in recent years is in part due to 1) rise in temperatures not killing the bugs over the winter 2) bugs resistance to chemical treatments. Bed bugs are I think related to ticks.

The problem is parasites. For bad ones I think there will be a need for more exorcisms & people dealing also with 'spiritual ' parasites. To me, the two are related. I think as our civilization heads further down the stairs spiritual parasites also come in to feed off the misery.

So there will a need for hygiene, both physical and spiritual. The spiritual hygiene need not go into moral histrionics, but follow some common sense. This I think is the reason behind various religious teachings laws & codes. Certainly some stories can be spun around these themes.

Justin Patrick Moore's picture

I know a few people who have been afflicted with Lyme disease -itself a controversial diagnosis in the medical industry- so we might see a proliferation of this as well, as ticks are carriers. That would also be a good area for a story.

Blueberry's picture

A number of years ago before my old GP retired had a large tick bite, went into his office. Asked about lyme disease. Answer" Not this far South but you need to be concerned about the other 27 tick diseases we have." Treatment was 100mg of Doxy for 30 days. Fast forward to last year found a big tick on my leg went to see my NP same treatment. The Uk has a big problem with ticks, folks are putting FRONTLINE on there shoes before going in the woods.

Weird Meat Allergy Caused by Ticks May Be Easier to Catch Than We Thought
https://gizmodo.com/weird-meat-allergy-caused-by-ticks-may-be-easier-to-...?

"One of the strangest side-effects of a tick bite—a new allergy to red meat—could be even easier to get than previously thought. New research out this weekend suggests that bites from certain ticks can cause the allergy no matter what they’ve recently bitten. The finding could overturn a commonly held theory that ticks need to have recently gorged on the blood of other mammals before they can spread a meat allergy to humans.

"The allergy is caused by an immune response to a sugar molecule called alpha-gal. Most mammals have alpha-gal in their muscles, but not humans and other primates. For some reason, the bite from certain ticks can sometimes spark a sustained hypersensitivity to things that contain alpha-gal, most notably red meat, which includes beef, pork, and even sometimes dairy.

"This hypersensitivity acts almost exactly like a typical food allergy, with symptoms like hives, trouble breathing, or even a life-threatening anaphylactic shock. But it’s the only known food allergy to a sugar, rather than a protein, and its symptoms take hours to appear after exposure. Sometimes, the allergy only seems to kick in years after the initial bite."

Mother Nature is a joker. If you just get squicked by ticks and the food allergy, you might not catch the sick joke inherent in the report: you don't get the food allergy if you confine yourself to humans and other primates.