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Treatment of clothing with a permethrin spray for personal protection against the western black-legged tick,Ixodes pacificus (Acari: Ixodidae)

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Abstract

The synthetic pyrethroid, permethrin, when applied to clothing with a pressurized spray at an application rate estimated previously to be 4 μg a.i./cm2, was found to be 100% effective for personal protection against all three parasitic stages of the western black-legged tick,Ixodes pacificus Cooley and Kohls. This tick has been implicated as the primary vector of the Lyme disease spirochete (Borrelia burgdorferi) to humans in the far-western United States. Periods of exposure to permethrin-treated cloth as brief as 10 and 45 seconds incapacitated 100% of subadult and adult ticks, respectively, within 1–3 h post-treatment. Under field conditions, permethrin appareatly does not repel questing adult ticks, though 100% of ticks recovered from treated clothing after exposures as brief as ≤15 seconds were moribund 1 h later.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Entomological Sciences, University of California, 201 Wellman Hall, 95720, Berkeley, CA, USA

    R. S. Lane

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  1. R. S. Lane
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Lane, R.S. Treatment of clothing with a permethrin spray for personal protection against the western black-legged tick,Ixodes pacificus (Acari: Ixodidae). Exp Appl Acarol 6, 343–352 (1989). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01193304

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01193304

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