Yet another "new" species of Borrelia in the U.S. that doesn't show up on Lyme tests

[Ricobord]

http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20140313005328/en/Milford-Hospital-Pathologist-Identifies-Strain-Lyme-Disease#.UyItwUO9KSM

A Milford Hospital Pathologist says he's found yet another new species of Borrelia in a patient who was treated for neuroborreliosis.  He even speculates that perhaps this new species is more difficult to treat than Borrelia Burgdorferi.

The evidence continues to mount that some people with Lyme Disease (or the more appropriate name of Borreliosis) test false negative on the CDC's Lyme testing.

[cave76]

Very interesting, thanks.

Did anything in the report or the publication say if it was thought that the new bacterium was restricted to the UK or Europe. (Of course we all know how those little basturds can travel.) (grin) (I read the report and the pdf quickly so I may have missed (a lot).

[cave76]

AND (after re-reading the comments in that other forum) I see this:

"  Milford hospital pathologist, and the director of Milford Medical Laboratory says of the 300,000 newly diagnosed cases of Lyme disease each year, many “can be helped earlier if they were correctly diagnosed to begin appropriate medical treatment.”

Yeah! Ain't it the truth? Not just talking about the new bacterium but all the others that have been around for decades!!!

"Correctly diagnosed" !!! Add "immediately" and I bet none of us would be here if that happened!

Ranting, raving and venting!!! Sorry. (No I'm not)

[Ricobord]

This hospital is in Connecticut and the samples were provided by the CDC, so it's a good assumption that they're U.S. based patients.

The previously unknown species was discovered in 1 of 12 samples the pathologist studied. The patient with the new species had been diagnosed and treated with neuroborreliosis.

In another pool of 20 samples from untreated but suspected Lyme cases, 1 had Borrelia Miyamotoi.  

Both of these pools are tiny, suggesting that these other species could be far more common than anyone may have thought.  If b. miyamotoi were as rare as the CDC thinks it is, then statistically, you'd have to look at many thousands of samples to find one.

Since the CDC decided years ago that North America only had Borrelia Burgdorferi, they stopped looking for anything else.  Of course when no one is looking for you, it's easy to run amok.

I desperately hope that the CDC throws out it's Lyme two tier testing and develops a much more reliable test (or series of tests) that catches early stage infection as well as late stage infection of any and all Borrelia species.

While we'd still have the conflict over treatment, at least more people could get diagnosed properly.