Co-infections | For Physicians | Lyme Controversy | Lyme in Manitoba | Miscellaneous | Voices on Lyme
CBC News: Lyme disease research, funding falling behind in Canada
June 18th, 2017 – by Jennifer Seiff for CBC News
When I got sick in May 2016 with what I suspected was Lyme disease, I learned fast about tick-borne illnesses in Canada.
What I learned was that out-of-date lab tests mean many people may altogether miss a diagnosis of Lyme — an infectious disease spread through the bite of infected ticks that can produce symptoms ranging from fever to death.
They get sicker without treatment. The health-care system spends much more to treat them when they have a chronic illness.
Antibiotic Resistance is an in hospital phenomenon ((https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1113836) and is associated with short term high dose I.V. antibiotics and an agricultural problem when antibiotics are used on healthy animals to compensate for poor animal husbandry practices and it has not been a factor with Lyme disease patients taking long-term oral antibiotics for a year to 2 years to treat the disease. Success in Lyme disease treatment depends on the length of treatment using multiple antibiotics for the various forms that Borrelia bacteria can assume and not on using high dose short term antibiotics due to the biology of Borrelia bacteria.
From the article:
“The 2015 Manitoba Health protocol indicates that if a doctor thinks a person might have Lyme, the patient should be offered antibiotic treatment immediately, without waiting for a test to confirm it.”
“The 2015 Manitoba Health protocol indicates that if a doctor thinks a person might have Lyme, the patient should be offered antibiotic treatment immediately, without waiting for a test to confirm it.”