Hi All!
I just came across this article that explains that spirochetes have actually been seen in tick poop!! ACK!
This means no handling of ticks with bare hands! Don't remove them from pets or other people with your bare hands, otherwise you could be re-infecting yourself even if the tick hasn't attached to you!
The study does say that the spirochetes weren't culturable (they couldn't get them to grow in the lab), but it
did say that the
saw them in the poo!! The tick poo looks like dirt or dried blood near where the tick was attached.
Here is a link to that article. You can read the abstract for free.-
online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/vbz.2011.0922