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Except that fire ant stings are guaranteed to be painful. Not all tick bites are guaranteed to give you Lyme's disease.

I'll take the risk. Lyme's disease is a life long issue. Fire ant stings last about a week at the most.

I thought it was "Lyme disease can be a life long issue"?

It is. If diagnosed early (i.e., during the "bulls eye" stage) about a 2-3 week course of antibiotics will take care of it.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyme_disease#Treatment

I can vouch for this.

About 15 years back I was living in a rural area of New Hampshire and got the "bulls eye" mark on my leg. Never saw the tick in this case but ticks and bites were common around there.

I promptly went to the doctor to get a course of antibiotics and never had further health issues.

Now I'm in rural Texas and surrounded by fire ants. I need to rethink my life choices.

"Chronic Lyme Disease" is pseudoscience.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronic_Lyme_disease

Not sure if this shows 'pseudoscience' or that there is a reported set of symptoms which science hasn't proven or disproven..

Just because there is not scientific evidence doesn't mean something doesn't exist.

This makes fire ants a trade up. Guaranteed pain is always better than a nonzero chance of a permanent crippling disease.

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