LSU Health New Orleans Doctor Makes Fascinating Find Linking Lone Star Tick Bites to Meat Allergies

BATON ROUGE, La. (KPEL News) - An LSU Health New Orleans doctor is finding yet another bad side effect of tick bites that is affecting people in Louisiana and in other parts of the US: meat allergies.

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We all know many of the common illnesses tick bites can cause, as pointed out by the CDC:

• Fever/chills
• Aches and pains
• Headache
• Fatigue
• Muscle aches
• Rashes
• Lyme disease with joint pain

So, how can a tick bite cause a meat allergy? Dr. James Diaz with the LSU Health New Orleans tells Louisiana Radio Network that a Lone Star tick can transmit chemicals from animals they feed on when they bite humans.

You may develop antibodies against Alpha-gal and since Alpha-gal is in all red meat, you may develop an allergy to red meats. That includes beef and pork and lamb...(also) some people develop an allergy through gelatin (made from animal byproducts)...because they’ve been given certain monoclonal antibodies to treat things like Ulcerative Colitis and Crohn’s Disease that have been developed in mice.

The Lone Star tick spreading the allergy in the United States since 2015 has a white spot on its back and feeds predominantly on White Tail Deer, says Dr. Diaz.

How serious of an effect can these allergies have on humans? The victim can suffer anaphylactic shock, which caused quite a scare for someone waking up in the middle of the night with a scratchy throat and difficulty breathing after you ate red meat hours earlier. A shot of epinephrine at the emergency room can get you back to normal but the allergy is there.

There have been a few cases in Louisiana but the majority of cases spread by the Lone Star Tick are in Virginia and surrounding states, highlights Louisiana Radio Network. It's also very rare that humans are infected.