A New Jersey dad who collapsed and died after eating a hamburger has been identified as the first known fatality from a rare meat allergy caused by a tick bite.

The 47-year-old victim, an otherwise healthy airline pilot, is the first known death from alpha-gal syndrome (AGS), a disease spread by bites from the lone star tick that has sickened hundreds, according to a study published Wednesday by researchers at the University of Virginia.

The otherwise unidentified New Jersey dad first noticed red meat made him sick after eating a steak on a family camping trip during the summer of last year, leaving him “writhing in pain, having diarrhea and vomiting.”

“I thought I was going to die,” he told his son the next morning, according to the study.

Then two weeks later, in September 2024, the pilot and his wife attended a barbecue back in New Jersey, where he had a burger.

Just four hours later, his son found him on the floor of the bathroom in a pool of vomit. He died later that night.

It was initially labelled a “sudden unexplained death,” but blood tests confirmed alpha-gal syndrome, the obscure condition triggered by a bite from a lone star tick that causes severe allergic reactions to beef, pork, and lamb.

The death “is notable because it is the first documented anaphylactic death related to AGS where the symptoms started several hours after consuming mammalian meat,” said the study, printed Wednesday in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.

Confused by how her healthy hubby had died, the wife had turned to a paediatrician friend, who then sent a blood sample to the researchers.

After a slew of tests, the researchers asked if the man had ever been bitten by ticks. The wife “said that earlier in the summer he had 12 or 13 ‘chigger’ bites around his ankles,” which are assumed to be from the lone star ticks, the study said.

Symptoms of alpha-gal syndrome include an itchy rash, dizziness, and difficulty breathing. In the pilot’s case, researchers are particularly surprised that the only symptoms were vomiting and nausea.

As the name suggests, the tick is actually from the southern US, but migrated northward due to warming temperatures and large deer populations that serve as breeding grounds for their larvae.

Lone Star ticks have recently spread to Long Island. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention singled out Suffolk county as an alpha-gal hotspot in a 2023 report.

“The significance of this case is that a large and increasing population of the United States is being exposed … both because the tick is moving north and because there are now large populations of deer in many states,” the study warned

“A large number of physicians are not aware of the AGS,” warned the study.

“There is a major need for public education in areas where the tick is increasing.”