Ticks and tick-borne diseases are widely distributed worldwide, especially in tropical and subtropical regions, where they represent an large proportion of animal diseases endangering sustainable animal production and food security.  

Ticks cause significant economic losses to livestock production globally, adversely affecting livestock hosts in several ways. Most importantly, ticks transmit pathogens that cause acute and subclinical tick-borne livestock diseases, such as anaplasmosis, babesiosis, theileriosis and heartwater, as well as tick-borne zoonotic diseases, such as Crimean Congo haemorrhagic fever.

Tick control in the livestock sector is heavily dependent on acaricides. This dependency has resulted in the development of resistance, which has been reported against all acaricidal classes. The ability of ticks to develop resistance against different classes of acaricides is aggravated by malpractices in the application of acaricides, the use of substandard products and the lack of strategies to delay the emergence of resistance.   

In addition to animal health risks and production losses, there are also public health and environmental concerns over acaricide handling and residues. Furthermore, there are misgivings regarding the extensive use of antimicrobials to prevent the transmission and control of some of the major tick-borne diseases affecting livestock in the (sub) tropical regions. 

Funded by