LA Times: The Lyme disease battle
True believers and researchers face off over ticks and symptoms.
November 7, 2013
There is a subculture in America you may know little about. Its members are haunted by a slender, twisting, tick-borne germ known as Borrelia burgdorferi, the microbe responsible for Lyme disease, and they are trying desperately to warn us that we are all at risk of contracting a debilitating, chronic illness characterized by joint pain, fatigue, mood disorders and a long list of other symptoms.
Arrayed against these true believers are most of the mainstream scientists who study B. burgdorferi. Although they acknowledge that Lyme disease is a genuine illness that humans can get from being bitten by infected ticks, and that those who are not treated promptly can develop worse symptoms, they don’t believe that infection leads to a chronic condition. The thousands of people who attribute their symptoms to “chronic Lyme disease” are simply misguided, many researchers believe….”