Proper Tick Removal

One of the best, easiest, and safest ways to remove a tick when it is embedded in your skin. All you need is a pair of fine tipped tweezers. This video also explains why you should not use vaseline, a hot match or your fingers.

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Captions courtesy of the Radical Access Mapping Project, on the Un-ceded Coast Salish Territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples.
To learn more, see: http://radicalaccessiblecommunities.wordpress.com/subtitled-videos/
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Hi, I'm Gary McDougall.
(Penticton, B.C. and Area Lyme Group)

I wanted to show you one of the best methods for
removal of a tick once it's embedded in your system.

Let's pretend that this balloon is a tick

that's worked its way down in via its mouth parts

into your skin.

So this is its body out here, and this is its mouth.

Now, hopefully you'll never find a tick this large in you,

because of course you'll have some problems.

But people come up to me and they say

"Y'know what I've done is, I've used a hot match,

or I've used Vaseline to get rid of it".

The thing is, you don't want to do that

because remember

this is its mouth parts inside your skin,

and if you did that to it, they tend to vomit.

What then happens is

it then comes out in your system.

So its stomach contents will eject into your system.

You also don't want to grab it by the top

and pull it off with your fingers

because you've just squeezed

a dirty hypodermic needle into your system.

The best way to do it

is to get some small very sharp pointed tweezers.

These are very large for this demonstration,

but they'd be much smaller than this.

You work it in underneath the tick's body

because its head is down in your skin there.

And you squeeze it, and that cuts off its throat,

so it can't regurgitate into your skin to begin with.

And then very carefully

without twisting and turning, just pull straight up.

And the interesting thing is

it'll look just like this, as its head pulls out.

And hopefully it'll come out clean and in one piece,

and then you put on an antiseptic on there,

and you're done, that's all there is to it.