Biodiversity may lessen Lyme disease.The richer a region's array of lizard and small-mammal species, the less likely people are to catch Lyme disease Lyme disease, a nonfatal bacterial infection that causes symptoms ranging from fever and headache to a painful swelling of the joints. The first American case of Lyme's characteristic rash was documented in 1970 and the disease was first identified in a cluster at , say New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of researchers. That's the pattern emerging from an 11-state area, say Richard S. Ostfeld of the Institute of Ecosystem Studies The Institute of Ecosystem Studies (IES) is an independent, non-profit organization dedicated to the scientific study of the world’s ecosystems and the natural and human factors that control and change them. in Millbrook and Felicia Keesing of Siena College in Loudonville. The trend could provide a new reason to love biodiversity--it protects human health--they say in the June CONSERVATION BIOLOGY conservation biology n. The branch of biology that deals with the effects of humans on the environment and with the conservation of biological diversity. . The U.S. government logs between 12,000 and 17,000 cases of Lyme disease a year, making it the most common insect-borne disease in the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. . At least two species of Ixodes ticks spread it when they bite. The ticks typically hatch uninfected, but as they take one blood meal during each of their three later life stages, the ticks pick up bacteria. Only some of the 100 or so species that ticks bite can easily infect them with bacteria. The white-footed mouse, a common species, transfers the disease exceptionally well. An abundance of other tick targets could dilute the concentration of such dangerously good infectors and thus slow disease spread, the researchers suggest. Small-mammal diversity ranged from 26 species in Maine, with some 50 Lyme cases per 100,000 residents, to 38 species in Georgia, which reported fewer than 5 cases per 100,000. Maine has no native lizards, but Georgia has 14. |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion