Alpha-Gal syndrome is a tick-borne allergy to a sugar found in red meat. For some livestock producers, it not only affects their health but also their livelihood.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
One of the most dangerous animals on a farm is one of the tiniest – the lone star tick. A small bite can lead to alpha-gal syndrome, which can be especially hard on farmers in close contact with livestock every day. Harvest Public Media contributor Rebecca Smith explains why.
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REBECCA SMITH, BYLINE: It’s a bright, crisp morning on the Love Lake Iris Farm in northern Missouri. Owner Sharon Pennington is standing in the barn where she’s raised countless orphan calves and nurse cows over the years. But now, for the first time, the barn sits empty.
SHARON PENNINGTON: One cow calved and she had too much milk, so I was milking her and around all that fluid and just wondering, why in the world am I going to (laughter) pass out or die?
SMITH: Pennington was repeatedly experiencing anaphylaxis, a severe, full-body allergic reaction. And after months of fear and confusion, she was diagnosed in the summer of 2025 with alpha-gal, a potentially life-threatening allergic reaction to a sugar found in mammalian products, such as red meat and dairy, that comes from the bite of a lone star tick. But for her, these anaphylactic reactions weren’t just from eating mammalian-based foods. They also occurred after handling her cattle and their bodily fluids.
PENNINGTON: I was thinking, I need to make sure my will’s lined out. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.
SMITH: Doctors aren’t sure if these severe reactions are due to alpha-gal syndrome or if the allergy is kicking the immune system into overdrive more generally.
SCOTT COMMINS: There’s not great data.
SMITH: That’s Dr. Scott Commins. He’s an allergist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and one of the leading alpha-gal researchers in the country.
COMMINS: Patients are saying one thing and giving us reports of symptoms and reactions.
SMITH: Those symptoms can include full-body hives, trouble breathing, irritated eyes and even heart issues. He says there are some options for treatment, including medication, but it can cost thousands of dollars a month.
At the University of Nebraska, researcher Shaun Cross just completed a first-of-its-kind survey of farmers and ranchers with alpha-gal. He says more than 200 farmers from 28 states responded – the majority from Missouri, Oklahoma and Arkansas, where the lone star tick is common.
SHAUN CROSS: Sixty-nine percent of the respondents said that they had to modify work tasks associated to farming and ranching due to the diagnosis.
SMITH: And he says the preliminary results show that 78% reported that their diagnosis was causing them to feel distressed and worry about the productivity of their farm or ranch.
CROSS: The idea of, like, a person shuttering down a farm that’s been in their family for generations because of this new diagnosis, I can only imagine what that really does feel like.
SMITH: Rancher Kelly Decker raises beef cattle and sheep in north-central Oklahoma with her husband and says she really struggled when first diagnosed in 2019. She considers herself lucky because her reactions are manageable as long as she doesn’t eat red meat and is careful around their livestock. But she knows of producers with alpha-gal who’ve had to leave farming.
KELLY DECKER: My heart breaks for the people who have had to deal with that and have had to go through losing part of their identity from this allergy.
SMITH: Decker says when that happens, the already small community of livestock producers gets even smaller, so she wants to see livestock and farming groups bring more attention to alpha-gal so that producers can navigate this growing issue.
For NPR News, I’m Rebecca Smith in Missouri.
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