Archive for the ‘research’ Category

Lyme Found in Genital Lesion – Sexual Transmission Studies Screaming to be Done

https://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=240044

Bacterial Agent of Lyme Disease Detected in a Genital Lesion

International Team of Scientists Led by Union Square Medical Associates Finds Further Evidence for Sexual Transmission of the Tickborne Disease.

San Francisco, CA, USA – WEBWIRE – Monday, May 6, 2019

“We have taken Lyme disease out of the woods and into the bedroom”

A report describing detection of the bacterial agent of Lyme disease in a genital lesion lends support to possible sexual transmission of the disease. The report was published in the prestigious Journal of Investigative Medicine High Impact Case Reports (https://journals.sagepub.com/articles/hic), and it supports a pilot study previously published in the online journal F1000Research(https://f1000research.com/articles/3-309/v3).

Lyme disease is a tickborne infection caused by Borrelia burgdorferi, a type of corkscrew-shaped bacteria known as a spirochete (pronounced spiro’keet). The Lyme spirochete resembles the agent of syphilis, long recognized as the poster child for sexually transmitted diseases. Recently the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that Lyme disease is much more common than previously thought, with over 400,000 new cases diagnosed each year in the United States. That makes Lyme disease in this country about twice as common as annual new cases of breast cancer and four times more common than annual new cases of HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection and syphilis combined.

The current study was a collaborative effort by an international team of scientists. Researchers included Marianne Middelveen, a veterinary microbiologist from Calgary, Canada, molecular biologist Jennie Burke from Sydney, Australia, and nurse practitioner Melissa Fesler and internist Raphael Stricker from Union Square Medical Associates in San Francisco, CA.

“Our findings demonstrate the complexity of Lyme disease,” said Fesler, a lead author of the published study. “It explains why the disease is more common than one would think if only ticks were involved in transmission.”

In the study, researchers examined a genital lesion in a patient on treatment for Lyme disease. The lesion was found to contain live spirochetes that could be grown in special culture broth, and sophisticated immunology and molecular techniques revealed that the spirochetes were indeed Borrelia burgdorferi, the agent of Lyme disease. Testing for syphilis spirochetes and other pathogens was negative.

“The presence of live spirochetes in a genital lesion strongly suggests that sexual transmission of Lyme disease occurs,” said Middelveen. “We need to do more research to determine the risk of sexual transmission of this syphilis-like organism.”

Dr. Stricker pointed to the implications for Lyme disease diagnosis and treatment raised by the study. “We have taken Lyme disease out of the woods and into the bedroom,” he said. “We need to find better drugs to treat this runaway epidemic just like we did for HIV/AIDS and HCV.”

__________________

**Comment**

The 2014 pilot study should have sent a shock wave throughout the world.  Should have, but didn’t.  The CDC/IDSA/NIH barely rolled over in bed.  2014 study found in this link along with animal studies:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2017/02/24/pcos-lyme-my-story/

Notice it’s the same folks looking into this?  Where’s the big studies?  Where’s the power-players with all the money?

Studying Zika and climate-change.

Lida Mattman, PhD. & Elizabeth Burgess, PhD. have been sounding the alarm on Bb being transmitted in a variety of ways since the 80’s:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/02/transmission-of-lyme-disease-lida-mattman-phd/
 

Category:

Lyme, research, Syphilis, Testing, Transmission

Tick App – UW Madison Tick Research You Can Be a Part Of

Tick App Complete Flyer (2019)

Details in link

  1. Download the app (>18 years-old)
  2. Complete consent form & enrollment questions
  3. Log daily activities

You will get:

  1. Free tick reminders
  2. Report a tick at any time. Send a pic and they will identify it
  3. Find out tick activity in your area
  4. Learn how to prevent tick bites
  5. Info on tick removal
  6. Info & FAQS

 

Category:

Activism, Lyme, research, Ticks

Lyme Disease Imposes Large Cost On the Northeast United States

https://environment.yale.edu/news/article/ecosystem-disservice-lyme-disease-imposes-large-cost-on-the-northeast-united-states/

Lyme Disease Imposes Large Cost On the Northeast United States

lyme disease tick warning
Kyle Besler via Shutterstock

As people across the northeastern U.S. begin venturing back into the outdoors with the arrival of spring, they will make 1 billion fewer trips than they otherwise would have if Lyme disease didn’t exist, a new Yale study concludes.

In an analysis published in the journal Environmental and Resource Economics, researchers found that perceived risks of contracting Lyme disease on average cause a person in the Northeast to forego eight 73-minute outdoor trips per year, costing them about nine hours of outdoor time per year. Although the cost of individual lost trips is small — about $2.75 to $5 — the total cost roughly $2.8 billion to $5 billion annually due to the large number of people in the region.

“Lyme disease has been around for a few decades but it still has a big cost to society,” said Eli Fenichel, an assistant professor at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&ES) and senior author of the paper. “But the cost is not what people spend on doctors, or medicine, or even bug spray. These are costs that everybody incurs because we’re all choosing second-choice activities to avoid getting Lyme disease.”

“It’s a lot of people making very small changes, but in such a densely populated region that has major impacts.”

Lyme disease is caused by the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi and is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected blacklegged tick, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Prevalent across the northeastern U.S. and the Great Lakes region, the disease causes fever, headaches, fatigue, and skin rash. It can be prevented by use of repellents and removing ticks, as well as costly steps to remove tick habitat.

Or, as the researchers illustrate, individuals can simply find alternative activities to avoid tick habitat altogether.

To evaluate how the risk of Lyme disease impacts human behavior, the researchers analyzed data from the American Time Use Survey — a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics-based project that provides nationally representative estimates on how, when, and with whom people spend their time — and CDC data from 2003 to 2012.

After comparing those datasets, they found that the average individual in the average county spent 1.54 fewer minutes outside per day in response to an average of 72.17 Lyme disease cases reported to the CDC. This amounts to about 9.41 hours annually.

The research team say that though it is difficult to put a monetary cost on these lost opportunities, they calculate welfare loss based on the amount individuals are willing to spend to travel to recreate outdoors relative to spending leisure time at home — the location of most indoor leisure.

“People are giving up trips, and it’s not just hiking and camping in the woods,” said Kevin Berry, a former postdoctoral scholar at F&ES and the lead author of the study. “It’s trips to the park, soccer games, or walks and bike rides in places where there are stands of trees and tall grasses… a wide variety of activities pretty much anywhere in this part of the Northeast that’s outdoors.”

The findings illustrate the importance of careful evaluation when evaluating the ecosystem services and, in some cases, ecosystem “disservices” of nature.  Indeed, though the historical notion that forests are places for humans to fear has largely been replaced by recognition that these spaces provide important services — including recreational opportunities — there remain some risks that can undermine these potential benefits, including the threat of tick-borne Lyme disease.

Lyme disease is representative of many environmental problems, Fenichel said; environmental risks and harms can have seemingly minor impacts on individuals, but can impose profound costs on society.

“It’s an issue that affects all of us, but it’s one of those environmental challenges that are so difficult to handle as a society,” Fenichel said. “It’s a big issue in aggregate — up to $5 billion in this case — but to anyone of us it’s not a big issue. Everybody cares a little bit, but perhaps not enough to take action. Though, in aggregate we’d be much better off if we cooperate to deal with Lyme disease.”

The study was a collaboration between Fenichel and three former postdoctoral scholars at F&ES: Berry, who is now at the University of Alaska, Anchorage; Jude Bayham, who is now at California State University at Chico; and Spencer Meyer, a senior conservationist at the Highstead Foundation.

– Kevin Dennehy    kevin.dennehy@yale.edu    203 436-4842
___________________
A few points:
  1. Lyme has been around since the beginning of time:  https://www.utoronto.ca/news/u-t-researchers-find-ancient-iceman-s-infection-helps-lyme-disease-bone-loss-discovery
  2. The science is not settled regarding ALL the methods of transmission but it’s highly likely the Deer tick is NOT the sole perp:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/02/transmission-of-lyme-disease-lida-mattman-phd/
  3. While this is interesting data, I wish research would be done on truly important matters like transmission, testing, treatments, and cost to the sick people having to pay out of pocket for this plague.

 

Category:

Activism, Lyme, research

Bartonella Transmitted to Children at Birth Causing Chronic Infections

https://news.ncsu.edu/2010/05/bartonella/?fbclid=IwAR2Lf1BBOaAbdKshR76e0Kou-KPUt-H0QVw4Xv_6GFOX_2GoufhEmrg0ZrQ

Disease Caused By Insect Bites Can Be Transmitted To Children At Birth, NC State Researcher Finds

May 3, 2010

A North Carolina State University researcher has discovered that bacteria transmitted by fleas–and potentially ticks–can be passed to human babies by the mother, causing chronic infections and raising the possibility of bacterially induced birth defects.

Dr. Ed Breitschwerdt, professor of internal medicine in the Department of Clinical Sciences, is among the world’s leading experts on Bartonella, a bacteria that is maintained in nature by fleas, ticks and other biting insects, but which can be transmitted by infected cats and dogs as well. The most commonly known Bartonella-related illness is cat scratch disease, caused by B. henselae, a strain of Bartonella that can be carried in a cat’s blood for months to years. Cat scratch disease was thought to be a self-limiting, or “one-time” infection; however, Breitschwerdt’s previous work discovered cases of children and adults with chronic, blood-borne Bartonella infections–from strains of the bacteria that are most often transmitted to cats (B. henselae) and dogs (B. vinsonii subsp. berkhoffii) by fleas and other insects.

In his most recent case study, Breitschwerdt’s research group tested blood and tissue samples taken over a period of years from a mother, father and son who had suffered chronic illnesses for over a decade. Autopsy samples from their daughter–the son’s twin who died shortly after birth–contained DNA evidence of B. henselae and B. vinsonii subsp. berkhoffi infection, which was also found in the other members of the family.

Both parents had suffered recurring neurological symptoms including headaches and memory loss, as well as shortness of breath, muscle weakness and fatigue before the children were born. In addition, their 10-year-old son was chronically ill from birth and their daughter died due to a heart defect at nine days of age.

Results of the parents’ medical histories and the microbiological tests indicated that the parents had been exposed to Bartonella prior to the birth of the twins, and finding the same bacteria in both children, one shortly after birth and the other 10 years later, indicates that they may have  become infected while in utero.

Breitschwerdt’s research appears online in the April 14 Journal of Clinical Microbiology.

“This is yet more evidence that Bartonella bacteria cause chronic intravascular infections in people with otherwise normal immune systems, infections that can span a decade or more,” Breitschwerdt says. “Also this new evidence supports the potential of trans-placental infection and raises the possibility that maternal infection with these bacteria might also cause birth defects.”

The Department of Clinical Sciences is part of NC State’s College of Veterinary Medicine. Dr. Breitschwerdt is also an adjunct professor of medicine at Duke University Medical Center.

Note to editors: An abstract of the paper follows.

“Molecular evidence of perinatal transmission of Bartonella vinsonii subsp. berkhoffii and B.henselae to a child”
Authors: Edward B. Breitschwerdt, Ricardo G. Maggi and Patricia E. Mascarelli, NC State University; Peter Farmer, Department of Pathology, North Shore University Hospital
Published: April 14, 2010 in Journal of Clinical Microbiology

Abstract:
Bartonella vinsonii subsp. berkhoffii, Bartonella henselae or DNA of both organisms was
amplified and sequenced from blood, enrichment blood cultures or autopsy tissues from four family members. Historical and microbiological results support perinatal transmission of Bartonella species in this family.

_________________

**Comment**

If it weren’t for the work of this singular man, we’d be clueless about the implications of Bartonella.  Heavily vested in finding answers due to his father’s death to Bartonella, Dr. Breitschwerdt is the only one currently looking at congenital transmission:  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3044516/#!po=1.02041

What’s is going to take? How many more have to become infected before transmission studies on ALL implicated pathogens in Lyme/MSIDS are done?

We’ve known about Lyme for over 40 years and we still don’t have good studies looking at this very real issue of sexual and congenital transmission.  Only one study on sexual transmission done in 2014 showed the Lyme organism in semen and vaginal secretions, but the medical world sniffed and rolled over in bed.  Nothing’s been done since.

Why?

As to congenital transmission (mother to baby), Canada recognizes it, but the U.S. still doesn’t: https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/10/05/canada-acknowledges-maternal-fetal-transmission-of-lyme-disease/  There’s 33 years of documentation gathered by a ticked off Canadian mom who happens to be a nurse: https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/06/19/33-years-of-documentation-of-maternal-child-transmission-of-lyme-disease-and-congenital-lyme-borreliosis-a-review/

I guess more moms have to get ticked off before something changes in Lyme-land. Frankly, if it weren’t for moms, we wouldn’t even know Lyme exists.

We need these transmission studies done on each and EVERY single organism implicated with Lyme/MSIDS.  We can talk tick prevention all the day long until we are blue in the face, but what if you can contract Lyme/MSIDS through a variety of means? Many say we can:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/02/transmission-of-lyme-disease-lida-mattman-phd/

http://www.endowmentmed.org/pdf/endowmentupdatelymes2.pdf  In 1995 Dr. Mattman obtained positive cultures for Bb from 43 of 47 chronically ill people. She also recovered Bb spirochetes from 8 out of 8 Parkinson patients, 41 cases of multiple scierosis (MS), 21 cases of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and ALL tested cases of Alzheimer’s.

But what do I know?  I’m just a crazy gray-hair.

More on Bartonella:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/01/03/bartonella-treatment/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/24/human-bartonellosis-an-underappreciated-public-health-problem/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/03/24/cat-scratch-disease-caused-teens-schizophrenia-like-symptoms-report-says/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/08/case-series-bartonella-ocular-manifestations/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/03/02/skin-inflammation-nodules-letting-the-cat-out-of-the-bag/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/01/02/bartonella-langerhans-cell-histiocytosis-cancer/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/11/10/neurological-presentations-of-bartonella-henselae-infection/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2017/01/04/endocarditis-consider-bartonella/

 

 

Category:

Bartonella, research, Ticks, Transmission

Upstate NY Disease Expert: Prevention Really Works. Do it.

https://www.newyorkupstate.com/news/2019/05/upstate-ny-lyme-disease-expert-prevention-really-works-do-it.html

Upstate NY Lyme disease expert: Prevention really works. Do it

The black-legged tick, also known as the deer tick, can carry a variety of pathogens, including the bacteria that causes Lyme disease.

The black-legged tick, also known as the deer tick, can carry a variety of pathogens, including the bacteria that causes Lyme disease.

By Glenn Coin | gcoin@syracuse.com

Syracuse, N.Y. — Bryon Backenson has taken ticks head-on since 1992, walking the woods and fields of New York and Connecticut to find, gather and test disease-carrying ticks.

“We go to 150 sites in spring and fall to collect ticks,” said Backenson, New York’s deputy director of communicable disease control. “In the years we’ve been doing this with staff and students, we’ve never had anybody who has gotten a tick-borne disease.”

Ticks, particularly the black-legged or deer tick, carry a variety of diseases. The most common and well-known is Lyme disease, caused by a bacteria carried in the tick’s gut.

Backenson said he and his fellow researchers are living proof that prevention works.

“We practice what we preach,” he said.

false

Upstate NY tick expert: How to protect yourself from Lyme disease

Ticks have been increasing as the climate warms, SUNY ESF researcher says.

He recommends that if you’re going to be in an area likely to have ticks, you do what researchers do:

— Wear light-colored clothes so you can see the dark ticks climbing on you.

— Tuck the bottoms of your pant legs into your socks to make it harder for ticks to reach your skin.

–Check your entire body at least every 24 hours, and remove any ticks you find on your skin.

— Consider using bug repellents that contain DEET for skin and permethrin for clothes. (Researchers in the field have one disadvantage here: They can’t wear bug repellent because they’re trying to catch ticks, not scare them away.)

“As long as people take the proper precautions and end up removing ticks, there’s a really good likelihood you’re not going to get some tick-borne disease,” Backenson said. “If you happen to get the rash from Lyme, or flu-like symptoms that make you suspect Lyme, early doses of antibiotics can cure relatively quickly the majority of cases we see.”

Backenson also said that most tick bites likely don’t lead to disease because the ticks are pulled off before they can ingest blood and inject the bacteria. He said New York has about 8,000 new cases of Lyme disease every year, but he estimates that New Yorkers get 40,000 to 50,000 tick bites every year.

“I firmly believe there are lots and lots of tick bites out there that don’t necessarily lead to disease,” Backenson said.

The health department has several videos on its website about how to keep ticks away, and how to pull them off when they bite.

The peak season for Lyme disease, late spring and summer, is approaching. That’s when the tick nymphs are feeding, and they account for the vast majority of Lyme disease cases. While nymphal ticks are less likely to carry the bacteria than adult ticks, nymphs are much smaller, so people don’t see them to remove in time. Nymphs also tend to be most active in summer, when more people are out in woods and fields.

In much of Upstate, about 25 percent of nymphs carry the Lyme bacteria. That jumps to about 50 percent in adults, which have fed more often than nymphs and have had more chances to get the bacteria from the blood of deer, rodents and other animals.

___________________

**Comment**

A few points:

Ticks are marvelous ecoadaptors and are impervious to the climate as shown by independent Canadian tick researcher John Scott:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/08/13/study-shows-lyme-not-propelled-by-climate-change/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/11/07/ticks-on-the-move-due-to-migrating-birds-and-photoperiod-not-climate-change/

“For blacklegged ticks, climate change is an apocryphal issue.” – John Scott

Again, researchers are about statistical significance – not individual significance.  If you are the ONE sorry sucker who gets infected, all the statistics in the world become irrelevant.  Why they state such things is beyond me.  Treat each and EVERY tick bite seriously.  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/12/07/igenex-presentation/ In this link we learn about a little girl that within 4-6 hours has facial palsy, and couldn’t walk or talk.  Some cases escalate quickly.

As far as the bull’s eye rash goes, anywhere from 27-80% get it – hardly a sure thing. IF you have the rash, you HAVE LYME DISEASE.  Period.  If you don’t get the rash, it means nothing.  The rash criteria has kept people from diagnosis and treatment for decades.  Don’t let this happen to you.  The “wait and see” if you develop symptoms approach has not and will not ever work.    If you are bit by a tick, go in immediately and demand treatment.  This could very well save your life and prevent you from chronic life-long symptoms.

 

 

 

Category:

Activism, Lyme, research, Testing, Ticks