Did You Know?

This is a series of fun nutrition tidbits, facts, and research that I’ll be continuing as I come across wild and interesting things to know in the world of nutrition.

So, did you know that a tick bite may lead to a red meat allergy?

This story made its rounds on the internet a few years ago, but I found the implications fascinating. Multiple research studies from the USA, Sweden, and Australia all found that there was a correlation between people who had an IgE allergy to red meat and had been bitten by ticks. While it’s not really possible to do a double-blind controlled trial on this type of information (you know, it probably wouldn’t be cool to stick a bunch of ticks on people and see what happens), this correlation seems well-observed.

• Head over to The New Yorker to read more:
        “Can Ticks Make You Allergic to Red Meat?”
• MedPage Today also covered the correlation found by a Swedish study:
        “Allergy to Red Meat Linked to Tick Bites”