https://www.news4jax.com/health/2020/10/01/taking-on-ticks-some-lyme-disease-symptoms-can-be-mistaken-for-covid-19/  News Video Here

Taking on Ticks: Some Lyme disease symptoms can be mistaken for COVID-19

Fever, chills, shortness of breath, fatigue, muscle aches, body aches, headaches, nausea, vomiting — sounds like the symptoms of COVID. But actually, it’s Lyme disease.

And this year is expected to be an exceptionally bad year for ticks. In fact, because more people are spending time outdoors and in the wilderness, due to the pandemic, experts fear more people will come down with Lyme disease. (See link for article)

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**Comment**

The article discusses Olivia Goodreau’s story. Barely able to walk, she saw 51 doctors before she was diagnosed.  She also never saw the tick or the rash, and ONE tick bite caused  5 other diseases.

Mainstream medicine STILL hasn’t embraced these facts that are more common than not.

Key quote:  

“You have migratory muscle pain or migratory nerve pain, tingling, numbness, burning, stabbing. That is the hallmark of Lyme,” said Dr. Richard Horowitz, a board-certified internist at Hudson Valley Healing Arts Center.

Despite increasing stories like this one and worse, hit pieces continue to pour forth denying the severity of the disease and maligning doctors who take a different approach:  https://www.businessinsider.in/science/health/news/reckless-lyme-disease-treatments-are-injuring-and-killing-patients-as-alternative-doctors-get-certified-to-treat-the-illness-report-finds

Do not kid yourself.  There is a political war that’s been going on for over 40 years regarding Lyme/MSIDS.  These public health ‘authorities’ are increasingly coming underwire for conflicts of interest and actual scientific fraud.  They are squirming in their seats.  I was not surprised to see the recent article that again regurgitated the 5 cases of IV antibiotic treatment for Lyme, published in the MMWR, that had poor outcomes. The CDC has a long and sordid history of maligning anything that competes with their lucrative interests:  .https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/04/26/cdc-playbook-learning-from-lyme/

Regarding the 5 cases which were cherry-picked, it was discovered that one of the authors, a CDC epidemiologist, allegedly solicited IDSA doctors for evidence of harm from IV antibiotic treatments, essentially bribing them by offering co-authorship of the report if anecdotes were used. No such solicitation was made for IV treatment success stories – showing complete bias.  There has been hot debate on Lyme treatments for decades. The MMWR paper is only one example of bias which is embedded within the CDC. There are many success stories using IV therapy by a Wisconsin Doctor and IDSA founder who disagreed with his colleagues on how to treat Lyme disease.

The article then drags Dr. Sponaugle through the mud, insinuating that he caused a recent death of a patient because he was “previously flagged for Lyme disease-related malpractice in 2014.”

Again, I write about this common crucifixion of Lyme literate doctors here:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/04/26/cdc-playbook-learning-from-lyme/

What you must understand is the CDC is a bully and can not and will not have opposition, so they do all in their power to dictate clearly to other doctors the accepted narrative by their draconian “guidelines” and making examples out of those who dare to draw outside the lines (investigations, hefty fines, medical license expulsion and loss of revenue and reputation).  These are not idle threats and have been used over and over worldwide.

https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/27547/20201001/t-gondii-parasite-neuropsychiatric-behavioral-conditions

New Study Associates Parasite With Various Neuropsychiatric and Behavioral Conditions

Oct 01, 2020

At the beginning of summer, health authorities in several states announced warnings against amoeba in freshwater lakes that cause a severe brain infection. A recent study highlights a parasite called Toxoplasma gondii, or T. gondii, and its association with neuropsychiatric and behavioral conditions.

Scientists from Imperial College London’s London Centre for Neglected Tropical Disease Research published their study in the cell journal Trends in Parasitology. Evidence suggests that T. gondii may be an underestimated threat to the world.  (See link for article)

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**Comment**

Cats have been simplistically blamed for the infection as the parasite is found in cat feces. Pregnant women have been warned to either wear gloves when changing cat litter or get someone else to do it:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/06/20/brazil-569-confirmed-cases-of-toxoplasmosis-of-which-50-are-pregnant-women/

You can also get it from undercooked meat:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/06/toxoplasmosis-outbreak-due-to-undercooked-deer-meat-from-illinois/

It was also found in 2009 in Ixodes ricinus ticks (endemic in Europe, also called the castor bean tick)  Fact sheet:  https://ecdc.europa.eu/en/disease-vectors/facts/tick-factsheets/ixodes-ricinus

Migratory birds are transporting ticks worldwide.

More on Toxoplasmosis:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/05/21/toxoplasmosis/

T. gondii has been connected to:

 

Regarding treatment the article states parasites notoriously evolve and resist drugs over time.

Researchers state that treatment and prevention need to expand beyond acute diseases and congenital transmission.

They also report that early trials of JAG21, a tetrahydroquinolone (a semi-hydrogenated derivative of quinoline), removed 100% of active T. gondii and that they hope to develop it into a nasal spray.

Excerpt from study:

Further, JAG21 is efficacious against drug-resistant Plasmodium falciparum in vitro (Malaria). Causal prophylaxis and radical cure are achieved after P. berghei sporozoite infection with oral administration of a single dose (2.5 mg/kg) or 3 days treatment at reduced dose (0.625 mg/kg/day), eliminating parasitemia, and leading to 100% survival. Enzymatic, binding, and co-crystallography/pharmacophore studies demonstrate selectivity for apicomplexan relative to mammalian enzymes. JAG21 has significant promise as a pre-clinical candidate for prevention, treatment, and cure of toxoplasmosis and malaria.  https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fcimb.2020.00203/full

https://globallymealliance.org/breaking-down-lyme-disease-and-the-blood-brain-barrier/

by Jennifer Crystal

In previous posts, I’ve mentioned the blood-brain barrier and the fact that tick-borne illnesses can cross it and infect the central nervous system. Daniel Cameron, M.D. and I also talked about the blood-brain barrier as part of our webinar on Lyme and COVID-19. Several patients have asked me to explain what exactly the blood-brain barrier is, how/why tick-borne infections cross it, and what it means when they do. Rather than give a short answer in one of my Dear Lyme Warrior…Help! FAQ posts, I thought I’d dedicate a blog to breaking down the science of the blood-brain barrier into layman’s terms.

The central nervous system consists of the brain and spinal cord. Since it plays a key role in most bodily functions, the body wants to protect the CNS from anything that could harm it, like pathogens. Therefore, the CNS has security: a protective border of cells that form the walls of blood vessels that regulate what moves between the blood and the brain. According to the Journal of Neuroinflammation, this protective border, known as the blood-brain barrier,

“separates the central nervous system (CNS) from the peripheral tissues. In order to maintain homeostasis in the CNS, the blood-brain barrier controls material, nutrients and cell transfer from the blood to the brain and from the brain to the blood.”[i]

To put it in simpler terms, think of a swim cap. Cloth swim caps are comfortable. They’re soft, and don’t hurt your scalp when you put them on. Unfortunately, though, the loose, thin material makes them more permeable than their rubber counterparts. Cloth swim caps don’t do their job of protecting your hair very well. You might have a nice swim, but you’ll probably get out of the water with wet or at least damp hair.

Rubber swim caps are tighter and thicker. They squeak as you stretch them over your skull, pulling on your skin. Once they’re on, though, you’re assured a fairly dry swim. When a rubber swim cap is worn properly, it protects your hair well; you can spend hours in the water and emerge with completely dry hair.

The blood-brain barrier is like a rubber swim cap. The body puts in place its best protective shields against its most vulnerable areas: a pregnant woman’s belly grows hard to protect her baby; scabs form to protect open wounds; the blood-brain barrier acts as a swim cap to protect your brain.

Unfortunately, even the best protection isn’t foolproof. Rubber swim caps don’t always work perfectly. A little hair can still creep out and get wet. A foreign object could perforate the material, allowing water to seep in. In the case of the central nervous system, that foreign object could be a pathogen—say, a sneaky spirochete (the bacteria that causes Lyme disease) that can spiral its way across the blood-brain barrier, causing a security breach that jeopardizes the integrity of the central nervous system.

In his book Lyme Disease: Medical Myopia and the Hidden Global Pandemic, Bernard Raxlen, M.D. writes,

“In some of the earliest Lyme research, Dr. Burgdorfer, the researcher after whom the Lyme Borrelia organism is named, showed that the bacterium had the capability to penetrate cell walls.” He gives an overview of the way spirochetes can penetrate the blood-brain barrier: “Borrelia can traverse this barrier by the addition of plasminogen, which is localized to the site of the spirochete-endothelial cell interaction, leading to a transient breakdown of the blood-brain barrier and facilitating the invasion of B. burgdorferi in the central nervous system.”[ii]

In other words, Lyme bacteria turns a rubber swim cap into a cloth swim cap, easily breaking through to the central nervous system. Once that security has been compromised, spirochetes (as well as other tick-borne pathogens, like the parasite Babesia can burrow deep into the brain and spinal cord. The infections then wreak havoc on the central nervous system, causing symptoms such as brain fog, sleep disturbances, word loss, or repetition. tremors, headaches, and even paralysis.

At this stage, the infection becomes much more difficult to treat. But while the road to recovery will likely be long, hope is not lost. Lyme Literate Medical Doctors (LLMDs) know which antibiotics can also penetrate the blood-brain barrier to chase and kill tick-borne infections. Sometimes this means intravenous antibiotics. Sometimes it means adding an anti-inflammatory medication that works in conjunction with the antibiotic to get across the barrier. While it will not help to share my ever-changing protocol, I can tell you that after prolonged treatment, my neurological symptoms are much, much better. Now I feel like I have a good strong swim cap again, and while that can sometimes be a little uncomfortable—i.e., I sometimes still have flare-ups—overall I am enjoying a great swim.

[i] Małkiewicz, M.A., Szarmach, A., Sabisz, A. et al. Blood-brain barrier permeability and physical exercise. J Neuroinflammation 16, 15 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12974-019-1403-x

[ii] Raxlen, Bernard, M.D. with Cashel, Allie. Lyme Disease: Medical Myopia and the Hidden Global Pandemic. Hammersmith Health Books: London, 2019 (100).

Related Posts:
Dealing With Brain Fog
Living with Lyme Brain
Stop the Music! How to X Out the Songs and Words That Keep Playing in Your Head


jennifer crystal_2

Opinions expressed by contributors are their own.

Jennifer Crystal is a writer and educator in Boston. Her memoir about her medical journey is forthcoming. Contact her at lymewarriorjennifercrystal@gmail.com.

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**Comment**

Great, easy to understand article.

For far too long our public ‘authorities’ have minimized the damage caused by this complex illness. The discoverer of the organism, Willy Burgdorfer; however, did not. For a short informative interview toward the end of his life:

http://

Footage from UNDER OUR SKIN. Though he is credited as the discoverer of the Lyme disease spirochete, Dr. Burgdorfer’s death on November 17, 2014 leaves behind many unanswered questions.

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/10/12/willy-speaks-from-the-grave-rickettsia-helvetica/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/09/16/48473/  Interview with Kris Newby on the Secret History of Lyme Disease and Biological Weapons

https://www.wnky.com/center-for-courageous-kids-partners-with-avril-lavigne-foundation/

Center for Courageous Kids partners with Avril Lavigne Foundation

SCOTTSVILLE, Ky. – The Center for Courageous Kids, the 168-acre not-for-profit medical camp facility located in Scottsville, which enhances the lives of seriously ill children at no cost, is partnering with The Avril Lavigne Foundation to continue their joint effort to help protect campers from Lyme disease. A 30-second promotional commercial spot featuring The Center for Courageous Kids will premiere during pop-rock icon Avril Lavigne’s one-of-a-kind livestream benefit concert on Oct. 24, 2020 at 7 p.m.  (See link for article)

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**Comment**

In 2019 the camp received a grant from The Avril Lavigne Foundation for tick prevention.  This was the first season without any tick bites!

Now that is something to celebrate

For more:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/04/12/tick-prevention-2019/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/07/20/ticks-lyme-disease-information-for-families/

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/22/coronavirus-vaccine-wont-bring-about-a-fairytale-ending-expert-.

Coronavirus vaccine won’t bring about ‘fairytale’ ending to pandemic, expert warns

 
KEY POINTS
  • As the coronavirus pandemic continues to haunt policymakers and the public around the world, a lot of hope is being placed in finding an effective and safe vaccine against Covid-19.
  • The chances of finding an effective vaccine soon are not that high, one expert told CNBC.  (See link for article)

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**Comment**

Important quote:

“This means that for half the people that get the vaccine it wouldn’t work,” Fisher said. “Most people aren’t expecting this to be 100% effective.

Meanwhile, make sure you are well read on this experimental fast-tracked DNA vaccine, most of which are made with fetal cell lines, need electricity to zap it into you, experts worry might cause chronic inflammation, autoimmunity, cancer, and a whole host of other important issues to consider, and will utilize 5G to monitor you and potentially modify your behavior.

Please see:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2020/10/05/covid-19-vaccine-explained/  Dr. Carrie Madej D.O. discusses the COVID-19 vaccine in this ground-breaking, informative documentary.  It is critical you educate yourself and others on this frightening technology that our ‘authorities’ are not being transparent about.

Between now and Dec. doctors see a:

  • four-fold increase in consultations in general practice in a GOOD Year
  • they see an 8 fold increase in an epidemic year 
  • 50% increase in deaths between now and January
But trust me, this will all be blamed on COVID.