Lone Star ticks in Illinois can carry, transmit Heartland virus
Symptoms may be mistaken for COVID-19; hospitalizations are common

Date:
July 23, 2020
Source:
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, News Bureau
Summary:
Researchers have confirmed that Heartland virus, an emerging
pathogen with potentially dire consequences for those infected,
is present in Lone Star ticks in two Illinois counties hundreds
of miles apart. Lone Star ticks were first detected in Illinois
in 1999 but had not been found to be infected with Heartland virus
in the state.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Researchers have confirmed that Heartland virus, an emerging pathogen
with potentially dire consequences for those infected, is present in
Lone Star ticks in two Illinois counties hundreds of miles apart. Lone
Star ticks were first detected in Illinois in 1999, but had not been
found to be infected with Heartland virus in the state.


==========================================================================
The findings are reported in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases.

In July 2018, a resident of Kankakee County was hospitalized after
suffering several tick bites while camping on private property. Two months later and more than 250 miles to the south, a resident of Williamson
County was hospitalized with many of the same symptoms: fever, diarrhea, headache, fatigue, decreased appetite and nausea. This patient also
noticed tick bites after camping. The Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention confirmed that clinical samples from both patients tested
positive for Heartland virus, which is spread by ticks. Both patients eventually recovered.

Tick-borne illnesses share symptoms with many other diseases and
misdiagnoses sometimes occur, said Holly Tuten, a vector ecologist with
the Illinois Natural History Survey who led the new research. INHS is a division of the Prairie Research Institute at the University of Illinois
at Urbana-Champaign.

"Heartland virus won't show up on a standard diagnostic panel for
tick-borne bacterial diseases," she said. "And with COVID-19 on the
collective mind, a tick-borne viral infection could be overlooked,
especially in cases where a tick bite was missed." According to the
CDC, there are no vaccines to prevent infection with the Heartland virus
or medications to treat it. Most people infected with the virus end up hospitalized and a few have died.



==========================================================================
To determine the source of the viral infections, health department
officials in each county interviewed the patients to learn where they
were when they were bit. This information allowed Tuten and her team to determine whether ticks in those areas carried the virus.

Previous research showed that the Lone Star tick, Amblyomma americanum,
can carry and transmit the Heartland virus, so the researchers focused
their efforts on collecting this species.

"Lone Star ticks are very aggressive ambush predators and many people
don't realize this," Tuten said. "I've seen Lone Star ticks run
across a forest floor to me." The site in Kankakee County was a rural homestead with barnyard animals and a small amount of forest surrounded
by cropland, Tuten said. The patient in Williamson County may have been
exposed in a heavily wooded wildlife refuge or outside a suburban home
with a few trees.

The researchers collected ticks in all three locales. They shipped
their tick samples to the CDC Arboviral Diseases Branch in Fort Collins, Colorado, where the ticks were combined in batches of 10-30 for testing.

"A single batch of male Lone Star ticks from each county was found to
be positive for the Heartland virus," Tuten said. "Infected Lone Star
ticks had been found as far north as Missouri, so we expected to find
the infections in ticks from Williamson County in the southern part
of Illinois. But finding so many Lone Star ticks in Kankakee County,
including some with the virus, really surprised us." The detection of Heartland virus in adult Lone Star ticks a year after human infection
suggests that the infected ticks may have overwintered in the area,
Tuten said.

"We want to alert physicians and public health officials throughout
Illinois that there is a fairly new pathogen out there that is a danger
to public health," she said. "I don't want people to avoid the woods and
parks. I just want them to be aware, so they can take concrete steps to
reduce tick encounters and bites." This investigation was a collaboration between the INHS Medical Entomology Laboratory, the Illinois Department
of Public Health, the CDC, conservation officials and Illinois residents.


========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Illinois_at_Urbana-Champaign,_News_Bureau.

Original written by Diana Yates. Note: Content may be edited for style
and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Holly C. Tuten, Kristen L. Burkhalter, Kylee R. Noel, Erica
J. Hernandez,
Seth Yates, Keith Wojnowski, John Hartleb, Samantha Debosik, April
Holmes, Christopher M. Stone. Heartland Virus in Humans and Ticks,
Illinois, USA, 2018-2019. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 2020; 26
(7): 1548 DOI: 10.3201/eid2607.200110 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/07/200723115835.htm

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