New Jersey man is first known death from meat allergy triggered by tick bites

Lone star ticks are the main cause of alpha-gal syndrome in the US. Brian CassellaChicago Tribune/TNS/Getty Images/File

In the summer of 2024, a previously healthy 47-year-old father collapsed and died in the bathroom of his New Jersey home. An autopsy provided no answers. Everything looked normal, and his death was ruled sudden and unexplained.

His widow reached out to a friend, a pediatrician. Would she read the autopsy report?

The pediatrician, Dr. Erin McFeely, acted on a hunch and contacted Dr. Thomas Platts-Mills, an allergist and immunologist at the University of Virginia who had discovered almost two decades earlier that tick bites could cause people to develop an allergy to red meat.

The allergy is unusual because the reaction doesn’t happen right away. People start to feel