Note: This article is worth reading if you suffer from Lymes, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinsons, Alzheimers, and many other chronic conditions.

Adapted from article by Jon Inder, England

There is growing concern and confusion over the issue of Lyme Disease in this country and in the broader global community.

You may not have heard of Lyme Disease, and if you have, you may have heard little more about it than that it is a 'rare' condition and one that is caused by infection from tick bite.

Worryingly, both of these statements are believed by many Lyme experts to be erroneous - and they believe that the consequence of such false assumptions could be disastrous.

In June of 2004, the U.S. Centre for Disease control and prevention (CDC) passed funding of $2.9 million to begin a comprehensive survey of Lyme Disease from Maine to Texas, which indicates that someone thinks the problem is a real one. Now many American Doctors are calling for action to prevent what many believe could be a pandemic (global epidemic).

Sadly, the story in this country is very similar, with many patients being pushed around from 'specialist' to 'specialist' - none of whom are actually Lyme specialists. Often it is many months before the condition is even recognised, and then it is frequently underplayed.

The first problem here is quite simply that Lyme is hard to see ... and to most medical doctors, seeing is believing. Many who have suffered from a Candida Infection or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome have learnt this fact at great cost, and concerns over other 'Stealth pathogens' is growing.

Most antibiotics work by destroying the cell wall of bacteria. The Borrelia burgdorferi (Bb) bacterium of Lyme, however, can exist without the cell wall typically characteristic of other forms of bacteria, which makes most antibiotics useless against Lyme.

The bacteria can also change forms to avoid detection when confronted by elements of the immune system or various antibiotics, and then turn back again when a threat to their survival is no longer present. These unusual properties of Bb have caused an unprecedented amount of confusion in the medical community - and with the public as well. Cell Wall Deficient Forms -Stealth Pathogens by Dr Lida Mattman

At a recent International Conference in Brighton, Doctors were able to actually present images of these bacteria 'on the move' in different states. These startling images included what appeared to be organisms 'running away' from the light caused by the scanning equipment. This has meant that Lyme often goes undetected until a time (often following a trauma or when immunity is low) when it chooses to 'become active' and therefore visible, again.

The blood tests used in this country (the Elisa and Western Blot) are based on response to antibiotics. If the Lyme is 'hidden' or inactive, then you are not diagnosed with Lyme. But that does not mean you haven't got it. Since the recognised medical definition of Lyme Disease was developed, research has also emerged showing that many of the initial assumptions concerning Lyme were wrong. The 'recognised' signs for the disease itself are leading medical professionals to simply miss it. For example, we now know that the bull's-eye rash following initial infection, originally thought to be the definitive diagnostic sign, may occur in only one-fifth to one-half of patients. Newer research indicates that ticks may be the least of our worries when it comes to contracting Lyme.

Researchers have found live spirochetes of Lyme in fleas, mites, and mosquitoes.

More worryingly, the CDC has now admitted what researchers found years ago, that Bb bacteria survive the purification process of donated blood and could be passed through blood transfusions.

(J Infec Dis 90; 62(2):557-9)

(Transfusion 89:29(7)6465)

However, as we have already noted, symptoms can come and go - often leading to false assumptions about recovery. The extent of the patients 'viral load' and of the damage caused by Lyme and co-infections are all variables to be taken into account.

Of course the tiredness is not likely to go away if the body's immune system is compromised. In fact, there is a growing body of evidence pointing to a link between Borreliosis infection and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. There are about 150,000 people with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) in the UK, many of them (over 25%) with symptoms so severe that they are wheelchair bound and unable to work. Like many disabled people in our society they are often marginalised and forgotten. In an informal study conducted by the American Lyme Disease Alliance (ALDA), 90.3% of patients diagnosed with CFS were found to have Lyme Borreliosis. In this country, Dr Andrew Wright, who spoke at the conference in Brighton, is currently involved in research projects with Sheffield and Sunderland universities into the links between bacterial infections and CFS.

The Californian Lyme Disease Association (CALDA) state that Lyme Disease has also been misdiagnosed as multiple sclerosis (MS), amyotropic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Lupus, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. All of these conditions are on the increase in the western world. In the U.S. the most common symptom of Lyme was thought to be Rheumatoid Arthritis. This is a condition linked to the first modern cases of Lyme, but this is based on the outdated CFC 'definition' of Lyme that fails to recognise that there could be more than one strain of bacteria implicated in the problem, not to mention the highly probable impact of co-infections.

Let us look at a few facts. Scotland, which has the highest incidence of Lyme in the British Isles, also has the largest number of diagnosed cases of M.S. in Europe. Mild winters have led to a huge explosion in the tick population, and in Scotland, increases in tick populations have been so huge that they have led to a drop in the grouse population. Disgruntled game hunters are not really the biggest problem here; £330,000 is spent on diagnosis and treatment of Lymes every year in the Scottish highlands but this could be just scratching the surface. Dr Jo Ann Whitaker, who has developed a new test for Bb, has found that a high proportion of Parkinson's patients have tested positive.

In the United States, the leading microbiologist Dr Lida Mattman who found evidence of Bb spirochaetes in human blood, semen and urine, had her Michigan laboratory closed down after she published her opinion that it was becoming hard to find people who had tested negative to use as control group.

Elsewhere in Europe the issue is at least recognised. In Czechoslovakia, public radio broadcasts have warned the public to look out for ticks, and issued instructions on what to do if bitten. The Czech Radio 7, Radio Prague website recently published a map of tick infested areas. Nobody has such a map here. Here we are told nothing and this country has no equivalent of the CFC - so who is investigating the problem?