Ticks, like mosquitoes, are among the species that are benefiting from climate change. As the planet warms, ticks proliferate not just in summer but throughout the winter, making tick-borne diseases in humans and other mammals more common than they used to be.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists 16 tick-borne diseases on its website, including Lyme disease, alpha-gal syndrome (which causes an allergic reaction to red meat) and Rocky Mountain spotted fever. The Asian blue tick can infect cattle with infectious anemia, which often leads to deaths that can strain the livestock industry.
While the blood-sucking arachnids have increasingly drawn public attention, they've been the subject of online rumors and conspiracy theories that Snopes has fact-checked for years. For example, in October 2017, we debunked a claim that PETA was releasing lone star ticks into the northeastern United States to give people red meat allergies. Later, in the spring of 2026, an unfounded rumor spread online that farmers were finding boxes full of ticks in their fields.
Below are eight claims involving disease-spreading ticks that we've investigated over the last decade.
