Outcry as scientists push to create ticks spreading meat allergies,
A recently unearthed study has set off a tidal wave of outrage after scientists claimed it was ‘morally’ justifiable to infect people with a virus making them allergic to meat.
Researchers Parker Crutchfield and Blake Hereth from Western Michigan University published an inflammatory paper in 2025, making the case that society had a moral ‘duty’ to spread ticks that were infected with or engineered to carry alpha-gal syndrome (AGS).
AGS is a real medical condition transmitted to humans through tick bites, causing victims to suffer allergic reactions when eating red meat, including beef, pork and lamb, dairy and other products derived from mammals.
The symptoms can range from a mild case of hives or stomach pain to severe and even life-threatening cases of anaphylaxis – where blood pressure suddenly drops and the person becomes unable to breathe as their airways swell up.
Crutchfield and Hereth claimed that it was morally wrong to eat meat because of the suffering animals endure and the environmental damage that the meat industry allegedly causes.
They argued that the only reason society should not be spreading ticks to infect people with AGS today is that scientists do not currently have an easy and effective way to do it on a large scale.
However, they added: ‘But it is feasible to genetically edit the disease-carrying capacity of ticks. If we are right, then today we have the obligation to research and develop the capacity to proliferate tickborne AGS and, tomorrow, carry out that proliferation.’
One critic of the study replied: ‘Isn’t this biological terrorism? Shouldn’t they be thrown in jail?’
Scientists argued that the only reason society should not be spreading ticks to infect people with AGS today is that scientists do not currently have an easy and effective way to do it on a large scale
Alpha-gal syndrome is a real medical condition transmitted to humans through tick bites, causing victims to suffer allergic reactions when eating red meat, including beef, pork and lamb, dairy and other products derived from mammals
The study authors did not conduct any medical experiments or new research to back up their claims, calling their paper a work of philosophy, using ethical reasoning from different moral theories and assuming that meat-eating is bad.
Their main findings were that promoting genetically modified ticks to spread AGS would make the world better and help people become more ‘virtuous’ by avoiding meat.
They also claimed that this process would not violate anyone’s rights, despite proposing to intentionally infect the population with a life-threatening infection.
AGS is triggered by a bite from the lone star tick, a breed of the parasite found throughout the US from Texas to the East Coast.
When a tick bites someone, it injects alpha-gal sugar into the person’s body, causing the immune system to develop antibodies that attack it.
Between 2017 and 2022, the CDC reported about 90,000 suspected cases of AGS, and the number of new suspected cases increased by approximately 15,000 each year. The agency has estimated that as many as half a million Americans have AGS.
It can also complicate medical treatments involving mammal-based ingredients in certain medications, vaccines or surgical materials. There is currently no cure, and the tick-transmitted illness requires lifelong avoidance of meat-based products.
‘Intentionally inflicting a debilitating disease on people is a horribly vicious crime and should get the strongest possible penalty,’ another person added on social media.
Between 2017 and 2022, the CDC reported about 90,000 suspected cases of AGS, and the number of new suspected cases increased by approximately 15,000 each year. The agency has estimated that as many as half a million Americans have AGS
The symptoms can range from a mild case of hives or stomach pain to severe and even life-threatening cases of anaphylaxis – where blood pressure suddenly drops and the person becomes unable to breathe as their airways swell up
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The Western Michigan University Homer Stryker MD School of Medicine defended the paper, published in the journal Bioethics, calling the researcher’s conclusions ‘a thought experiment.’
In a statement to the fact-checking website Snopes, the school wrote: ‘Thought experiments are a long-established and legitimate philosophical method.’
‘Their purpose is to examine the implications of ethical commitments and to surface hidden assumptions so they can be scrutinized. They are neither policy proposals nor clinical recommendations.’
However, the reaction from the public has been fierce, with critics blasting the authors for claiming that meat eaters should be infected with a disease to prevent them from eating meat.
‘Anyone who works to spread alpha-gal should be tried for crimes against humanity,’ one commenter on X said.
‘Who decided it was “morally” wrong to eat meat? Humans are not herbivores,’ another person added.
Despite the study’s claims that spreading diseases through ticks was only a philosophical experiment, scientists have claimed that the CIA has already been using ticks as weapons for decades.
Dr Robert Malone, who helped lay the groundwork for mRNA vaccine technology, claimed he analyzed declassified government documents from Cold War biological weapons programs that link the spread of Lyme disease to CIA experiments.
Malone highlighted experiments in the 1960s that allegedly released more than 282,000 radioactive ticks in Virginia and open-air tick research at Plum Island, a federal laboratory located near the Connecticut community where Lyme disease was first identified.
Malone’s report argued the research was part of a much larger Cold War biological weapons program known as Project 112, which involved dozens of secret tests aimed at studying how insects could be used to spread pathogens.
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Meanwhile, Google is currently facing backlash over plans to release millions of bacteria-infected mosquitoes in two states, allegedly to reduce mosquito populations.
Backed by Google’s parent company Alphabet, the proposal is seeking federal approval to deploy 32 million modified mosquitoes annually across California and Florida beginning in 2027.
If approved, the two-year program would result in a total of 64 million mosquitoes being released into the environment.
The aim is to reduce populations of disease-carrying mosquitoes using what researchers describe as ‘good bugs’ – males carrying a naturally occurring bacterium called Wolbachia. Male mosquitoes also do not bite.
When the infected males mate with wild females, the females still lay eggs, but the eggs fail to develop and hatch, which would theoretically kill off new waves of disease-carrying pests.
