Climate Change, Emerging Ticks and Tick-Borne Pathogens: Citizen Science as a Preventive Tool

Dr. Gábor Földvári reframes tick-borne disease risk through the lens of ecological intelligence, showing how microclimate, host–vector networks, and shifting landscapes reveal emergence long before pathogens reach patients. His framework in Episode 4 makes the case for surveillance that predicts, not reacts.

    
Ecology in Flux, Molecular Detection, and Early-Warning Systems for Tick-Borne Pathogens 

Emerging infections are not stochastic anomalies; they are the predictable outcomes of changing contact patterns between hosts, vectors, and pathogens. In our PREPARE-TID webinar series Episode 4, speakers from ecology, molecular parasitology, and vector-borne disease epidemiology presented complementary frameworks for anticipating and detecting tick-borne threats before they manifest as clinical case clusters. 

The share message was consistent between all the experts: surveillance must move “upstream” and integrate ecological, molecular, and genomic signals as part of a proactive, rather than reactive, One Health strategy. 


The parasite paradox and the Stockholm Paradigm 

Conventional co-evolutionary models assume that pathogens require novel mutations to invade new host species. Vector ecologist Dr. Gábor Földvári from the HUN-REN Centre for Ecological Research in Budapest challenged this assumption by referencing the Stockholm Paradigm, which proposes that: 

  • Pathogens exist as clouds of genetic and phenotypic variants within their current host range. 
  • Many variants are ecologically irrelevant under current conditions, but some are already capable of infecting additional hosts. 
  • Emergence is therefore opportunity-driven, not mutation-limited: contact, climate, and crowding determine whether these pre-existing capacities are expressed. 

Under this paradigm, host shifts and spillover events are expected outcomes of environmental change, not rare evolutionary exceptions. The COVID-19 pandemic illustrates this logic: cross-species transmission did not require an extreme genomic evolution, but it did require repeated ecological contact. 


Climatic and land-use drivers of vector expansion 

Dr. Földvári summarised more than a decade of data on the changing distributions of Ixodes ricinus and several Hyalomma species in Europe, highlighting: 

  • Warming winters (+1.5–2 °C) that reduce overwintering mortality. 
  • Increased vegetation cover in peri-urban mosaics, creating edge habitats with both wildlife and humans. 
  • Increased vegetation time enable longer activity of hosts and their ticks 
  • Growing wild ungulate populations, supporting high larval, nymphal and adult feeding success 

These trends support both latitudinal and altitudinal range expansion, creating new ecological interfaces where ticks, reservoir hosts, and humans overlap. Adult stages of Hyalomma species historically confined to Mediterranean and African zones are emerging now in parts of Central and Northern Europe with the possibility of overwintering in the near future. 


Microbial dark matter and the cost of inaction 

Dr. Földvári highlighted the gap between known and predicted pathogen diversity. 

Only a few thousand viruses in birds and mammals are characterized. Ecological models estimate ~1.5 million viral species in these hosts, with hundreds of thousands theoretically capable of infecting humans. Pre-COVID, the global economic burden of emerging infectious diseases was estimated at USD 1.3 trillion annually; cumulative COVID pandemic-related costs now exceed USD 20 trillion. 

Within this context, prevention via early ecological and molecular detection is not only a public-health priority but also the only economically viable long-term strategy. 


Host–vector–pathogen networks as predictive tools 

Traditional surveillance often reduces risk to binary presence/absence of a vector or pathogen. Dr. Földvári’s work instead uses interaction networks to quantify: 

  • Infestation intensity across host taxa; 
  • contribution of individual host species to larval, nymphal and adult tick cohorts (vector amplification potential); 
  • overlap between larval and nymphal feeding hosts; 
  • reservoir competence for Borrelia, Anaplasma, Babesia, and tick-borne viruses. 

Network metrics identify reservoir (amplification or bridge) hosts that connect otherwise separate ecological compartments and therefore act as critical nodes for pathogen flow. This provides a basis for predictive surveillance rather than retrospective description. 


The DAMA Protocol in practice: Document–Assess–Monitor–Act 

Dr. Földvári framed this predictive approach within the DAMA Protocol: 

  • Document: Establish baseline biodiversity for ticks, vertebrate hosts, and associated microbes. 
  • Assess: Evaluate risk of infection, vector competence, host reservoir status, and ecological conditions likely to alter contact rates. 
  • Monitor: Track microclimate, vegetation structure, host movement, and vector phenology over time. 
  • Act: Implement targeted interventions and intensified molecular screening in areas where ecological indicators suggest increased emergence risk, provide proactive suggestions to decision makers. 

He stressed that many projects stall at “Monitor”, with too few mechanisms to translate signals into timely public health action. 


Microclimate as the operative scale of risk 

Macroclimatic suitability maps are insufficient to explain local tick survival and activity. Key microhabitat variables include: 

  • Leaf-litter moisture retention. 
  • Ground-level temperature buffering. 
  • Under-canopy relative humidity. 
  • Canopy cover and evapotranspiration dynamics. 

The deployment of microclimate loggers and the use of NDVI and land-surface temperature layers now enable high-resolution risk mapping, allowing surveillance programs to prioritise specific habitats and edges, rather than broad regions, for sampling. 


Citizen science and Hyalomma detection: the Tick Watcher project 

The Tick Watcher citizen-science platform in Hungary demonstrates how DAMA can be operationalised: 

  • 900 citizen-submitted ticks between 2019–2025, including 29 confirmed adult Hyalomma spp. 
  • Repeated detections at several sites in southern Hungary, supporting the hypothesis of incipient local populations rather than sporadic introductions. 
  • Genetic barcoding indicated: 
  • H. rufipes clustering with African–European lineages (bird-mediated introduction). 
  • H. marginatum clustering with Eurasian clades (eastern migratory routes). 

No Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever virus (CCHFV) was detected in these Hyalomma samples, but metagenomic sequencing identified a previously undescribed Bunyaviricetes member (Volzhskoe virus), with links to Croatian and Norwegian strains. Even misidentified Ixodes and Dermacentor samples refined national tick biodiversity maps, underscoring the value of “bycatch” data. 
 
The ecological intelligence generated through these network analyses feeds directly into molecular and field surveillance workflows: 

  • Identify high-probability nodes for pathogen maintenance 
  • Prioritize tick sampling sites with the highest predicted tick density 
  • Pair ecological hotspots with pathogen-specific screening panels 
  • Pre-position diagnostic assays where emergence is most probable 
  • Inform clinicians in areas undergoing ecological transition 
     

Bring your diagnostics to the field 

We work with ecologists, surveillance programs, and molecular laboratories to integrate ecological forecasts into diagnostic strategies. SwiftX™ workflows are engineered for field deployments, mobile labs, and decentralized sequencing, delivering consistent DNA recovery even with variable sample quality, limited power, or challenging logistics.

 

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