Ticks are a fact of life.
Conventional thought seems to be that if you remove a tick that has been embedded just a short time (36 hours has been mentioned) there is very little chance of it passing on Lyme Disease -- even if it was infected.
Even so, nobody wants to find even one. This post ask show many EMBEDDED ticks you pulled off on your thru hike.
(edit: I had hoped to make this a poll but screwed up, oh well)