It’s tick season and the province is warning Ontarians to be careful as the number of cases of Lyme disease is on the rise.
It took seven years for Joanne Carroll to be diagnosed with Lyme disease after she was bitten by a blacklegged (deer) tick, while gardening at her home. “By the time I was finally diagnosed I was almost bedridden,” Carroll said.
“Ticks are not just in the bush, they’re in schoolyards, they’re in soccer fields, they’re in your garden,” Carroll says the bite caused a rash that looked like a bull’s eye which is a telltale sign that only some people with Lyme disease get. The rash eventually led to her diagnosis, but she says for years, multiple doctors couldn’t figure it out.
“I had symptoms of all kinds of different things because Lyme mimics so many other things,” Carroll said. Her symptoms included heart problems, memory loss, brain fog that prevented her from driving, and serious joint pain, “it took a good five years out of our entire family’s life.”
Carroll says she is doing better after years of antibiotic treatments, but still has difficult flare-ups. She is now the vice president of the advocacy group Lyme Ontario which works to raise awareness about the growing number of Canadians suffering from Lyme disease.
Statistics from Health Canada show the number of reported cases has skyrocketed from 144 in 2009 to more than 3,100 in 2021.
Carroll says, “I would say the number of those cases are even triple that because we are not being diagnosed so it’s not getting reported.”
Public Health Ontario says there is a risk of a tick bite causing Lyme disease across large swaths of southern Ontario, including Hamilton, Halton, and Niagara.
Carroll advises people to cover up when outside and check their bodies for insects when they come in. “The biggest safety you can have is to really check your body, kids, especially and ticks like to go to warm damp places, so behind the ears, under the armpits,” she said.
There is also a new app called eTick from Bishop’s University where people can report tick sightings, upload images and get information.
