ANTISCIENCE OR SCIENCE OR DESPERATION TO DENY LYME DISEASE PATHOGENSIS

Antiscience and Ethical concerns associated with Advocacy of Lyme Disease

Summary

Advocacy for Lyme disease has become an increasingly important part of an antiscience movement that denies both the viral cause of AIDS and the benefits of vaccines and that supports unproven (sometimes dangerous) alternative medical treatments. Some activists portray Lyme disease, a geographically limited tick-borne infection, as a disease that is insidious, ubiquitous, difficult to diagnose, and almost incurable; they also propose that the disease causes mainly non-specific symptoms that can be treated only with long-term antibiotics and other unorthodox and unvalidated treatments. Similar to other antiscience groups, these advocates have created a pseudoscientific and alternative selection of practitioners, research, and publications and have coordinated public protests, accused opponents of both corruption and conspiracy, and spurred legislative efforts to subvert evidence-based medicine and peer-reviewed science. The relations and actions of some activists, medical practitioners, and commercial bodies involved in Lyme disease advocacy pose a threat to public health.

No prizes for guessing the authors of this poorly presented article.link here

A threat to Public Health? not sure that the authors of the many science articles I have posted on this blog would concur with their Summary.

Now what we really need is more of the following:-

• Findings that shed new light on the possible pathogenesis of a disease or an adverse effect
• Lyme disease following a dog bite - was there a tick?

David Owen

Summary

Lyme disease is the most common tick borne infection in temperate zones and the reported incidence of the condition is increasing. Erythema migrans is one of the few clinical signs of Lyme disease and is usually indicative of recently acquired infection. A case is presented of Lyme disease with erythema migrans which followed shortly after a dog bite. The author is not aware of any previously reported similar case. The author considers that the development of Lyme disease in the case was most likely due to a coincidental tick bite which was not noticed by the patient but an alternative possibility is that the disease was activated from a latent form. Patients with Lyme disease may not give a history of tick bite and clinicians should be aware of this.

Link here

ANXIETY OR PANIC ATTACKS

Here's how to gauge whether your anxiety is linked to Lyme disease or other tick-borne diseases:

• Know how different panic attacks work. Panic attacks spurred by Lyme disease or other tick-borne infections are generally different than non-infectious-based panic attacks, explains Dr. Bransfield. A regular panic attack lasts a few minutes, but he says those brought on by tick-related ailments can go on for more than a half hour. If your panic attack symptoms grow worse while on once-effective antianxiety treatment, it's another sign that Lyme or a related infection could be causing the attacks.

• Know when to consider tick-borne diseases. Don't rely on finding a tick attached to your body to gauge your Lyme disease risk: Many people don’t recall being bitten at all, while others notice migrating rashes or red or black-and-blue splotches shortly after being bitten. Other early Lyme symptoms sometimes pop up a few days to a month after infection and include fatigue, fever, and chills. If the disease becomes more established in your body, it could cause cardiac and neurological problems. If you think you've been recently infected with Lyme, ask your doctor to perform blood tests, and if negative, have them repeated about six weeks later. If the results are still negative and you still suspect Lyme, you may want to see a doctor who specializes in treating Lyme aggressively. Doctors should first test to rule out other conditions with similar symptoms.

• Fight with your doctor if you need to. Lyme disease is a contentious subject, with two different schools of thought: Some consider to be a short-term infection, others believe it can be chronic. Some doctors take the threat of chronic Lyme seriously, and believe it should be treated with longer courses of antibiotics; others believe chronic Lyme doesn't exist. (Read Lyme Hearing Highlights a Broken System and Lyme Disease Treatment Guidelines: All Wrong? for more background.) Until more doctors recognize the severity of the disease, if you believe you have Lyme it's best to advocate for a clinical diagnosis using the strategy above.

The above is an extract from a recent article on Rodale to read the full article click here

There are many other interesting posts on work done by Dr Bransfied which searching in the search box on the right of this blog will find or looking at flipcard link top right may help.

ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE - A NEUROSPIROCHETOSIS

Alzheimer's disease - a neurospirochetosis. Analysis of the evidence following Koch's and Hill's criteria.

Judith Miklossy

• Correspondence: Judith Miklossy judithmiklossy@bluewin.ch

Journal of Neuroinflammation 2011, 8:90 doi:10.1186/1742-2094-8-90

Published: 4 August 2011

Abstract (provisional)

It is established that chronic spirochetal infection can cause slowly progressive dementia, brain atrophy and amyloid deposition in late neurosyphilis. Recently it has been suggested that various types of spirochetes, in an analogous way to Treponema pallidum, could cause dementia and may be involved in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Here, we review all data available in the literature on the detection of spirochetes in AD and critically analyze the association and causal relationship between spirochetes and AD following established criteria of Koch and Hill. The results show a statistically significant association between spirochetes and AD (P = 1.5 x 10-17, OR = 20, 95% CI = 8-60, N = 247). When neutral techniques recognizing all types of spirochetes were used, or the highly prevalent periodontal pathogen Treponemas were analyzed, spirochetes were observed in the brain in more than 90% of AD cases. Borrelia burgdorferi was detected in the brain in 25.3% of AD cases analyzed and was 13 times more frequent in AD compared to controls. Periodontal pathogen Treponemas (T. pectinovorum, T. amylovorum, T. lecithinolyticum, T. maltophilum, T. medium, T. socranskii) and Borrelia burgdorferi were detected using species specific PCR and antibodies. Importantly, co-infection with several spirochetes occurs in AD. The pathological and biological hallmarks of AD were reproduced in vitro. The analysis of reviewed data following Koch's and Hill's postulates shows a probable causal relationship between neurospirochetosis and AD. Persisting inflammation and amyloid deposition initiated and sustained by chronic spirochetal infection form together with the various hypotheses suggested to play a role in the pathogenesis of AD a comprehensive entity. As suggested by Hill, once the probability of a causal relationship is established prompt action is needed. Support and attention should be given to this field of AD research. Spirochetal infection occurs years or decades before the manifestation of dementia. As adequate antibiotic and anti-inflammatory therapies are available, as in syphilis, one might prevent and eradicate dementia.

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It is good to see further research by Judith Miklossy to visit her website click here and to read the full paper click here

I have posted about Alzheimer's before here of course those of us who have been following the information about Lyme disease are already aware of the work of Alan Mac Donald interviewed in Under Our Skin Documentary visit their website here or watch a Turn The Corner Foundation U Tube where Alan Mac Donald was interviewed. here

ONE IN FIFTY EIGHT CHILDREN IN THE UK WITH AUTISM- HOW MANY CAN BE PREVENTED?

A new study claims that almost double the number of children could have autism as previously thought.

An unpublished piece of research by Cambridge University's Autism Research Centre (ARC) found that as many as one in 58 children could suffer from the condition, which can affect speech, understanding and communication.

The above article was in the Telegraph in 2007 here

A recent paper by Robert C Bransfield MD

Preventable Cases of Autism : relationship between chronic infectious diseases and neurological outcome.

I don't have the fascility to copy and paste any of this paper but it is a must read, he talks about many chronic infections and their affect on the developing fetus. Access this paper here