If a Lyme disease vaccine gets approved, how would it go over? We asked hunters - NPR

Matthew Mealer holds up his targets at the Busch Shooting Range in Weldon Spring, Missouri, in May. Mealer said he's generally skeptical of new vaccines but might consider one for Lyme disease if it proves safe and effective. Kyle Pyatt for KFF Health News hide caption It's tick season, possibly the worst in a decade. More and more Americans are being exposed to these parasites as climate change expands the range where they can survive. That means more people are also exposed to the bevy of health conditions they can cause, such as Rocky Mountain spotted fever, the alpha-gal-triggered red meat allergy, and, most common of all, Lyme disease. Health Tick season is getting worse. Can managing deer help? For the latter, there may be some additional protection on the horizon. Pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Valneva announced this spring that they plan to seek regulatory approval for a vaccine to protect against Lyme disease. A previous vaccine for Lyme became available in the late 1990s but was pulled only three years later due to lawsuits, public fear of side effects, and a lack of interest. It's unclear whether this latest stab at a Lyme disease vaccine will get a warmer reception if it's approved, especially in the post-COVID era of vaccine skepticism. For a sense of how it might go over with rural populations at high risk of Lyme, KFF Health News spoke with a group of hunters. Few people spend more time in the woods exposed to ticks. At the same time, as a collective, hunters  skew conservative, rural, and male, according to a survey from the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership. And these are identities associated with increased hesitancy about or resistance to vaccines, according to Ashley Kirzinger, associate director for Public Opinion and Survey Research at KFF, a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News. For the latest stories on the science of healthy living,