Punkkien välityksellä leviävät taudit ovat koko ajan lisääntymässä Euroopassa. Osasyynä tähän on ilmaston lämpeneminen joka mahdollistaa punkkien leviämisen yhä pohjoisemmaksi.
Interdiscip Perspect Infect Dis. 2009;2009:593232. Epub 2009 Jan 4.
Effects of climate change on ticks and tick-borne diseases in europe. Gray JS, Dautel H, Estrada-Pena A, Kahl O, Lindgren E. School of Biology and Environmental Science, University College Dublin,Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland.
Zoonotic tick-borne diseases are an increasing health burden in Europe and thereis speculation that this is partly due to climate change affecting vectorbiology and disease transmission. Data on the vector tick Ixodes ricinus suggestthat an extension of its northern and altitude range has been accompanied by anincreased prevalence of tick-borne encephalitis. Climate change may also bepartly responsible for the change in distribution of Dermacentor reticulatus.Increased winter activity of I. ricinus is probably due to warmer winters and aretrospective study suggests that hotter summers will change the dynamics andpattern of seasonal activity, resulting in the bulk of the tick populationbecoming active in the latter part of the year. Climate suitability modelspredict that eight important tick species are likely to establish more northernpermanent populations in a climate-warming scenario. However, the complexecology and epidemiology of such tick-borne diseases as Lyme borreliosis andtick-borne encephalitis make it difficult to implicate climate change as themain cause of their increasing prevalence. Climate change models are requiredthat take account of the dynamic biological processes involved in vectorabundance and pathogen transmission in order to predict future tick-bornedisease scenarios. PMID: 19277106 [PubMed - in process]
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Valvojat: Jatta1001, Borrelioosiyhdistys, Bb