Tick-borne disease cases are skyrocketing in the Commonwealth. In 2024, Pennsylvania reported 16,624 cases of Lyme disease. While Lyme disease is the most well-known tick-borne disease, there are other tick-borne illnesses that pose a threat to the public health of Pennsylvanians.
 
Babesiosis is a tick-borne disease that can cause malaria-like symptoms, and over the past decade, cases have increased significantly in northeastern states. While this disease is currently a reportable condition in 40 states, Pennsylvania is not one of them. It’s time we change that.
 
Therefore, I plan to introduce legislation to require health care practitioners, health care facilities, and clinical laboratories to report cases of babesiosis to the Department of Health. In addition, since proper disease reporting is only part of the solution to the tick-borne disease epidemic, this legislation will require medical professionals to complete one hour of continuing education in tick-borne disease diagnosis and treatment as part of the initial licensure and renewal process.
 
While the Department of Health has issued proposed regulations to update their communicable and non-communicable disease regulations to include the reporting of tick-borne illnesses such as babesiosis, there is no guarantee that babesiosis will be included in the final-form regulations. Further, even if babesiosis is included, the final-form regulations are not due until September 2028. That delays full implementation until the end of 2028 or even into 2029. We cannot afford to wait that long for implementation of this reporting requirement.  
 
We cannot effectively come up with solutions and improve patient outcomes if we are not properly tracking tick-borne diseases or educating our medical professionals.
 
Please join me in cosponsoring this important legislation.