By Eric Spitznagel

The ticks got an early start this year, and they’ve been busy.

In April, 105 of every 100,000 emergency-room visits nationwide involved a tick bite, up 52% from the year before. In May, that number reached 112. The CDC has been tracking these visits since 2017, and this spring brought the highest early-season numbers it’s ever recorded.

Joanna Buchthal, Ph.D., an MIT Media Lab postdoctoral associate who directs research for Mice Against Ticks, says Telford often gets a theological version of the question at public events: Why did God make ticks?

“He generally starts with ‘beats me,’” she says, “followed by an explanation that almost no animals subsist on ticks alone, and that if that same God decided to vacuum up every tick on Earth, there would be effectively zero environmental consequence.”