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The 2025 National Tick Awareness Month Campaign asks, “Will Ticks Get Through?”
February 10, 2025
Not With You!
National Tick Awareness Month (NTAM), led by the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association (CVMA) in partnership with Merck Animal Health, focuses on key components of tick awareness to help protect pets and their people. We share information about tick activity, research showing where ticks are found in Canada, and highlight the important role the veterinary community plays in public health.
The 2025 NTAM campaign kicks off on March 1 with this empowering message: “Will Ticks Get Through? Not With You!” We can make it harder for ticks and the pathogens they may carry to navigate their way to pets by layering these three steps:
- Performing daily tick checks and avoiding locations where ticks can be found
- Using veterinary-approved tick control products for the duration of the risk period
- Considering Lyme vaccination for canine patients
“When you think about tick control and trying to reduce the risk of exposure to tick-borne disease, it helps to imagine a maze,” says CVMA president, Dr. Timothy Arthur. “If we do nothing, ticks can have a straight path to our pet, but by layering tick and tick-borne disease protection efforts, you can make the maze more and more complex, so it becomes harder for ticks to get through.”
The new in-clinic NTAM poster utilizes the imagery of a maze to help pet owners understand how each layer of protection you recommend plays an important role in protecting their pets! A poster will be mailed to all clinics across Canada (please consult your Merck Animal Health representative if you require additional posters) and new social media posts walk owners through each step and the difference it can make. As always, TickTalkCanada.com houses these new resources, as well as valuable educational tools and resources from previous NTAM campaigns to allow veterinary clinics easy access.
Dr. Arthur adds, “As veterinary professionals, we can leverage National Tick Awareness Month resources to spread this important information to help our clients minimize gaps in protection and safeguard their furry family members with all the resources available to them.”
NTAM 2025 Tools and Resources
NTAM Kick-Off Webinar (CE-CREDIT ELIGIBLE)
How to Maximize Pet Owner Understanding and Minimize Gaps in Protection in our Rapidly Changing Canadian Tick Landscape
Join us on Friday, February 28, 2025, from 12 to 1 p.m. EST for a webinar with Drs. Catherine Bouchard and Jason Coe.
It’s hard to keep up with the changing tick reality in Canada. It feels like something new is published every week! Dr. Catherine Bouchard, from the Public Health Agency of Canada, will share some “pearls of wisdom” from recent literature and summarize some of key updates related to ticks and tick-borne diseases in Canada with the goal of helping veterinary teams effectively communicate changing risks to pet owners.
Dr. Jason Coe, from the University of Guelph, will focus on how we can help pet owners understand the value of your tick control recommendations and how this understanding can minimize gaps in protection. Using the Spectrum of Care approach, Dr. Coe will explore the benefit of providing options to pet owners when engaging in tick control discussions.
2025 National Tick Awareness Month Pet-owner Engagement Tools
As in previous years, the CVMA, in partnership with Merck Animal Health, has created engaging communication materials and support tools to assist veterinary teams in their efforts to educate pet owners about ticks and tick-borne diseases.
- Video: "Will Ticks Get Through? Not With You!"
- Printable poster
- Ready-to-use social media posts
- Show your clients what the typical tick activity was in your city last year!
Please visit the CVMA website at canadianveterinarians.net/veterinary-resources/practice-tools/national-tick-awareness-month/ for more information on National Tick Awareness Month, to access NTAM resources, and register for the live launch webinar.