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Lyme Disease: Designer Drugs Urgently Needed (Latest press release)

San Francisco, CA, September 13, 2016 –(PR.com)– Lyme disease is a growing worldwide epidemic, and large “Big Data” surveys suggest that currently recommended antibiotic therapy is failing, according to a report published in the prestigious medical journal Infection and Drug Resistance.

Lyme disease is a tickborne infection caused by Borrelia burgdorferi, a type of corkscrew-shaped bacteria known as a spirochete (pronounced spiro’keet). The Lyme spirochete is most often transmitted by the bite of a black-legged tick, although person-to-person transmission via intimate contact similar to Zika virus has also been suggested.

Recently the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that Lyme disease is much more common than previously thought, with over 300,000 new cases diagnosed each year in the United States. That makes Lyme disease six times more common than HIV/AIDS, 20 times more common than hepatitis C virus infection and 30 times more common than tuberculosis in our country.

“Lyme disease is a growing epidemic,” said Lorraine Johnson, chief executive of the non-profit LymeDisease.org that oversees an online registry called MyLymeData with over 5,000 patients enrolled. “The use of ‘Big Data’ surveys is finally revealing just how bad the disease really is.”

The latest report points to staggering numbers of patients who fail short-course antibiotic treatment for Lyme disease. One study that mined a database of 47 million patients found that symptoms of Lyme disease could persist in up to two-thirds of patients despite antibiotic treatment.

“The use of these large surveys will unlock the truth about Lyme disease,” said Dr. Peter Mayne, who recently published the first comprehensive study of Lyme disease in Australia. “The outdated antibiotics used to treat the disease were developed 60 years ago, and they just don’t work well anymore.”

Dr. Raphael Stricker, an author of the report and Past President of the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS), pointed to the next steps needed to eradicate Lyme disease. “We need designer drugs just like the ones that have revolutionized the treatment of HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C virus infection,” he said. “The sooner that we start working on those ‘miracle’ drugs, the better for the world’s Lyme disease sufferers.”

The online version and video abstract of the report are available here: https://www.dovepress.com/articles.php?article_id=28846

Contact Information:
Jesus Walker-Salas, Union Square Medical Associates, 415-399-1035
officemanager@usmamed.com

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Contact Information:
USMA
Jesus Walker Salas
415-399-1035
Contact via Email
www.usmamed.com

To read more or watch Dr. Stricker’s interview, visit PR.COM

Expanded Study Confirms that Lyme Disease May Be Sexually Transmitted

International team of scientists led by Union Square Medical Associates finds evidence for sexual transmission.

San Francisco, California (PRWEB)
December 19, 2014

An expanded study confirms that Lyme disease may be sexually transmitted. The study was published in the open access journal F1000Research (http://f1000research.com/articles/3-309/v1).

Lyme disease is a tickborne infection caused by Borrelia burgdorferi, a type of corkscrew-shaped bacteria known as a spirochete (pronounced spiro’keet). The Lyme spirochete resembles the agent of syphilis, long recognized as the epitome of sexually transmitted diseases. In 2013 the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that Lyme disease is much more common than previously thought, with over 300,000 new cases diagnosed each year in the United States. That makes Lyme disease almost twice as common as breast cancer and six times more common than HIV/AIDS.

“Our findings will change the way Lyme disease is viewed by doctors and patients,” said Marianne Middelveen, lead author of the published study. “It explains why the disease is more common than one would think if only ticks were involved in transmission.”

The current study, which confirms and expands a preliminary report published in The Journal of Investigative Medicine, was a collaborative effort by an international team of scientists. In addition to Middelveen, a veterinary microbiologist from Canada, researchers included molecular biologists Jennie Burke, Agustin Franco and Yean Wang and dermatologist Peter Mayne from Australia working with molecular biologists Eva Sapi, Cheryl Bandoski, Katherine Filush and Arun Timmaraju, nurse-midwife Hilary Schlinger and internist Raphael Stricker from the United States.

In the study, researchers tested semen samples and vaginal secretions from three groups of people: control subjects without evidence of Lyme disease, individual patients who tested positive for Lyme disease, and couples engaging in unprotected sex who tested positive for the disease.

As expected, all of the control subjects tested negative for Borrelia burgdorferi in cultures of semen samples or vaginal secretions. In contrast, twelve of thirteen patients with Lyme disease had positive cultures for Borrelia burgdorferi in their genital secretions. Furthermore, two of the couples with Lyme disease showed identical strains of the Lyme spirochete in their semen and vaginal secretions, while a third couple showed identical strains of a related Borrelia spirochete in their genital secretions.

“The presence of live spirochetes in genital secretions and identical strains in sexually active couples strongly suggests that sexual transmission of Lyme disease occurs,” said Dr. Mayne, who recently published the first comprehensive study of Lyme disease in Australia. “We need to do more research to determine the risk of sexual transmission of this syphilis-like organism.”

Dr. Stricker pointed to the implications for Lyme disease diagnosis and treatment raised by the study. “We have taken Lyme disease out of the woods and into the bedroom,” he said. “We need to start fighting this runaway epidemic just like HIV/AIDS.”

Reference: F1000Research 2014;3:309 (http://f1000research.com/articles/3-309/v1). Contact information: Jesus Walker Salas, Union Square Medical Associates (mailto:officemanager(at)usmamed(dot)com)

Caption: Semen culture from a Lyme disease patient showing live Lyme spirochetes (left) next to a sperm cell (right). Dieterle silver stain, 1000x magnification. © Marianne Middelveen, all rights reserved, used with permission.

Contact: Jesus Walker Salas
415-399-1035

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