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Things Ticks Don't Want Your Family To Know
The concept of One Health will be front and centre during National Tick Awareness Month (NTAM), taking place in March. As part of this year’s campaign, the Canadian Veterinary Medical Association (CVMA), in partnership with Merck Animal Health, will highlight the important role of veterinarians in helping protect pets and people.
“We can all agree that companion animal ownership has increased in Canada in the past few years, and that the ben- efits of pet ownership are significant,” says CVMA President, Dr. Louis Kwantes. “Pets and people can be exposed to many of the same risks in the environment they share. Many pet owners don’t understand that their pets aren’t the only ones at risk of exposure to ticks and tick-borne diseases — they are, too. We know from the literature that dogs can be sentinels for human Lyme disease, and that information collected from the testing of companion animals provides an opportunity to improve public and veterinary health surveillance.”
In 2020, the NTAM campaign focused on WHEN ticks are active, emphasizing the unique seasonality of ticks and highlighting that tick activity can occur when temperatures reach 4°C and above.
The 2021 campaign went on to address WHERE ticks are in Canada, examining locations where ticks are present, and the expansion of tick risk areas in our country.
The upcoming 2022 campaign will share HOW pet owners can protect their pets and themselves against these parasites, with messaging centered on this year’s tagline: “Things ticks don’t want your family to know.”
Dr. Kwantes adds: “Through ongoing information sharing, veterinary, medical, and public health professionals can work together to help increase overall awareness and reduce, for both pets and people, the risk of exposure to ticks and to the patho- gens they can potentially transmit.”
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: “Things ticks don’t want your family to know”
- Ready-to-use social media posts
- Email summarizing all the available tools (including those from previous campaigns), grouped under the WHEN, WHERE and HOW themes, for easy access
- Fillable tick risk calendars
- Updated TickTalkCanada.com website
NTAM launch webinar
Once again, the NTAM campaign will be launched with a live webinar, on Wednesday March 2, 2022, from 12:00 to 1:00 p.m. EST. “One Health, ticks, and Lyme disease: The integral role veterinarians play.”
Guest speakers will include the following:
Dr. Katie Clow, DVM, PhD, Assistant Professor in One Health, Department of Population Medicine, Ontario Veterinary College.
Dr. Scott Stevenson, DVM, MSc, Owner, Thousand Island Veterinary Services, Companion Animal Parasite Council Board Member.
Dr. Michael Yabsley, MS, PhD, FRES, Associate Professor of Wildlife Diseases, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Georgia, Companion Animal Parasite Council Board Member.
Please click here to register.
Presented by the CVMA in partnership with:
