Here’s why you might be seeing a lot of photos of ticks on poppy seed muffins and bagels
If you’re about to eat your lunch, you might want to put it to the side for a moment.
On the heels of a report about illnesses from mosquito, tick, and flea bites tripling in the US from 2004 to 2016, The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tweeted out a photo of ticks on a poppy seed muffin on Friday to show just how tiny the disease-carrying arachnids are. The agency also provided a link to a tip sheet aimed at preventing tick bites.
[fragment number=0]
The tweet gained a good amount of attention, seeing about 1,400 retweets and more than 2,000 likes by Monday afternoon.
The reaction to the photos were swift — and the general consensus among those who saw it was a collective “ewww.’’
[fragment number=1]
[fragment number=2]
[fragment number=3]
[fragment number=4]
[fragment number=5]
[fragment number=6]
[fragment number=7]
The CDC seemed to take notice, sending out a new threaded tweet on Monday with a tongue-in-cheek apology.
[fragment number=8]
Meanwhile, the gross factor of the visual didn’t stop other media outlets from copying the experiment. Shortly after the new CDC tweet was sent out, Boston 25 reporter Stephanie Coueignoux posted a similar photo — this time, using a poppy seed bagel instead of a muffin.
[fragment number=9]
At least one person seemed to get pretty grossed out by it.
[fragment number=10]
Here at the Globe, though, it’s not like we can exactly pass judgment. In 2013, we published a photo gallery alongside a special report about Lyme disease, in which a professor used a bagel to compare the size of ticks to the small seeds.
Although the images are gaining some humorous reactions this month, the issue at heart is a serious one. Lyme disease is one of the most common reported infectious disease in New England, and the CDC report released last Tuesday shows that the number of reported cases of illnesses from mosquito, tick, and flea bites jumped from 27,388 cases in 2004 to more than 96,000 cases in 2016. (Officials say the actual number of people who have become sick is much higher, in part because many infections are not reported or recognized.)
Only one of the diseases in this category, yellow fever, has a vaccine approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
In Massachusetts, the number of cases of tick-borne disease has skyrocketed, and tens of thousands of residents are likely getting sick from the creepy crawlers each year, according to a state public health expert.
For more on the growing epidemic of tick-borne illnesses like Lyme disease, visit the Globe’s special section, Bitten by Uncertainty.
