JAMESTOWN — Anne Lane didn’t need a congressman, a scientist and a band of students wearing “Ticks Suck” T-shirts to tell her that Lyme disease is a growing threat in her neck of the woods.

Yesterday, as officials gathered here to warn Rhode Island’s southeastern communities of a boom in the deer tick population, Lang held up a placard with a hand-scrawled message.

“Eighteen of 20 families have had Lyme disease at Jamestown’s North End,” it read, describing her neighborhood.

Lane has several times had deer ticks removed from her body and sought treatment for Lyme disease. Fortunately, she was spared the worst, debilitating symptoms of the disease, and complains mainly of arthritis, one possible symptom.

“We’re all concerned. We are sort of sick of it at this point,” Lane said.

Officials pitched a tent downtown, at East Ferry Square, for a news conference aimed at raising awareness of Lyme disease prevention in Newport County, where tick populations have traditionally been low. Sampling has indicated that tick numbers have soared this year, increasing 242 percent at Middletown’s Norman Bird Sanctuary, 500 percent at Brenton Point, in Newport, and 842 percent at Jamestown’s Beavertail State Park.

“We need to address Lyme disease because it is affecting the lives of so many residents in our state,” said U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy, who helped organize the meeting. “While there is a reason for concern, we have a weapon in this battle…. The best way to treat Lyme disease is to prevent it in the first place.”

While intended to be educational — not theatrical — the conference did feature some props. They included a full-length mirror and spray bottles of tick repellent. Entomologist Thomas Mather, director of URI’s Center for Vector-Borne Disease, stood with his back to the mirror and then peered over his shoulder and through his legs to demonstrate the importance of looking for ticks on your body after you have been outdoors.

“You have to check yourself all over,” he said.

He also held up a bottle of spray tick repellent that he said should be applied to the inside and outside of clothing and shoes. The repellent lasts for up to a month after it’s applied, even after washing, he said. Sprays with DEET are not effective, he said. He also recommended hiring professional exterminators to spray the perimeter of residential yards. If you do find a tick on your body, remove it with tweezers and seek medical treatment within 24 hours of being bitten to best prevent Lyme disease. (For other tips, go to URI’s Web site, www.tickencounter.org.)

Every year, URI students under Mather’s supervision, who wear the “Ticks Suck” T-shirts, fan out across the state in June and July to count ticks. They visit each of 60 sites two times. They drag a swatch of white flannel through some greenery for 30 seconds and then count the number of nymphal deer ticks, the bloodsucker’s toddler stage. Then they repeat the process another 89 times. Haley Winsor has the record so far this year: 13 in one sweep at Trustom Pond National Wildlife Refuge, in South Kingstown. But significant numbers of ticks are typically the norm in South County since the tick sampling began about 15 years ago.

This year, while tick counts skyrocketed in Newport County, they dropped about 22 percent statewide. Mather attributed the drop to less humidity this summer and long periods without rain. Last summer, one of the wettest in many years, tick counts were the second-highest on record. Typically, said Mather, a 50-percent increase or decrease in deer counts corresponds with a 30 percent to 35 percent change in reports of Lyme disease cases.

“It makes these [Newport County] increases more alarming,” he said. “Something different is taking place.”

No explanation was offered for the rise in ticks in Newport County, but Mather cited deer populations and increasing vegetation as general factors. Second-growth forests have been growing since much of the state was deforested in the 19th century and that has helped deer thrive, he said. Deer, and humans, are prey for more mature ticks. Younger ticks feed on small rodents, such as mice, which is when they can become infected with the pathogen that causes Lyme disease.

One man held up a sign that read, “There’s a reason they’re called deer ticks.” He asked about thinning out the deer population on Jamestown.

“I know that’s a contentious issue here on the islands,” Kennedy said, urging people to lobby local and state governments for more hunting.

Lane favors that approach. Half a dozen years ago, in her wooded and less developed neighborhood of Jamestown, she rarely saw deer. Now, she says, “We have 25 go through the yard. You can’t garden. They eat everything.”

Until some solution is found, she’ll continue to keep her skin covered, use tick repellent and check herself daily. And just as she did when she found a deer tick on her hip three years ago, she’ll rush to a doctor.

Kennedy said Lyme disease is not a national issue, which makes it difficult for lawmakers to make it a priority. But it is a problem in New England, particularly in Connecticut and Rhode Island, which is believed to have the second highest caseload of Lyme disease per capita. So the congressman said he continues to fight for money for more research into a vaccine and more reliable tests to diagnose the disease’s sometimes mysterious, cold-like symptoms. He said it is “outrageous” that the state doesn’t spend more on Lyme disease and urged the public to lobby for more resources for URI to expand its research.

rsalit@projo.com