The post April 2024 Newsletter – May Lyme Awareness/Guest Blogs/LA4K Benefit/Researchers/HHS/Vaccine/Bartonella/Neuro Lyme/Chronic Lyme/Powassan Test/Transfusions/Ants/Lyme-AID/LymeX Diagnostics/Human Babesiosis/Stone Walls/Theileria appeared first on Lyme Disease Association ..read more

Every Year, the LDA provides written input to the U.S. House of Representatives Lyme Disease Caucus for its consideration in formulating its requests to the Subcommittee on Labor, HHS, Education and Related Agencies, House Committee on Appropriations.  Following are a few examples from FY2023 and FY2024 appropriations, where LDA submitted language that was used by the Lyme Caucus and was included in House report language for FY2023 and Explanatory Materials for FY2024.  FY2023:  The Committee encourages NINDS to evaluate how it may contribute to improvements in in tools to mana ..read more

May Awareness LDA Guest Blogger Cynthia Cobb is a seasoned registered nurse with nearly 30 years of nursing experience. She is a master’s-prepared certified school nurse in New Jersey and is currently finishing her doctorate (DNP) degree in the specialty area of Systems-Level Leadership with an anticipated completion date this August 2024. Cynthia is the Lead Nurse for the West Deptford School District where she has worked for the past 13 years, the President of the Gloucester County School Nurses Association since November 2018, and an active member of both the New Jersey State Schoo ..read more

On March 7, 2024 a meeting was hosted by the CDC that consisted of a small group of expert-advocates to develop the CDC’s understanding of the lived experience of Lyme disease. The goal of this meeting was to compile a list of individual questions to understand more about a future Lyme disease vaccine, the VLA15 vaccine in particular, given it was the only vaccine candidate being evaluated in phase 3 clinical trials as of the date of this meeting. Pat Smith reported on this meeting in the President’s Blog – In-depth Synopsis of Advocate Vaccine Meeting Hosted by CDC. The following is a list o ..read more

BMC Infectious Diseases (Dong, Y., et al.) 04.22.24, published “Post-COVID reactivation of latent Bartonella henselae infection: a case report and literature review.” In this case review, authors describe a 54-year-old male that presented with a “painful left upper arm mass.” The mass was resolved with antibiotic treatment. The man then experienced an infection with COVID which resulted in rapid regrowth of the mass. Additionally, he experienced pulmonary symptoms which included pleural effusion. The cause of the man’s symptoms was unknown until next generation sequencing (NGS) was perfo ..read more

Frontiers in Immunology (Geetha Parthasarathy) 04.03.2024, published “Fibroblast growth factor receptor inhibitors mitigate the neuropathogenicity of Borrelia burgdorferi or its remnants ex vivo.” Geetha Parthasarathy, Ph.D., assistant professor of microbiology and immunology at the Tulane National Primate Research Center, is the principal investigator who has identified a promising new approach to treating persistent neurological symptoms associated with Lyme disease.   Parthasarathy discovered a type of drug that had previously been studied for cancer treatment has shown to significan ..read more

Journal of Infectious Diseases & Therapy (Kinderlehrer, DA), 04.25.24 published “Chronic Lyme Disease: Why Is This Still Controversial?” In this article, Lyme Literate Medical Doctor, Daniel Kinderlehrer, MD describes that multiple mechanisms may be responsible for development of chronic Lyme disease. He evaluates many factors including the persistence of Borrelia burgdorferi infection; coinfections with other pathogens; inflammation associated with dysregulation of the immune system resulting in chronic systemic inflammation, autoimmunity, mast cell activation; autonomic nervous system d ..read more

Labroots, Carmen Leach, 04.01.24, reports on “A Better Way to ID Powassan Virus, an Emerging Tick-Borne Disease.” Leach reported that researchers developed a better PCR-based test that can detect and measure the level of virus for Powassan virus and Powassan virus lineage II (deer tick virus) in deer ticks (Ixodes scapularis). Researchers improved on current tests by providing the same ability to identify the virus with significantly more reliability than current tests in reducing the number of false negatives test results. This new PCR test utilizes a triplex method which amplifies the DNA o ..read more

The Journal of AABB Transfusion (Tonnetti, l., et al.) 03.16.24 published a case report, “A case of transfusion-transmission Anaplasma phagocytophilum from leukoreduced red blood cells.” Authors describe a case of Anaplasma phagocytophilum in a 64-year-old woman who was receiving weekly blood transfusions. The woman had gastric adenocarcinoma and multiple myeloma. A week after receiving a red blood cell transfusion, she presented with persistent fevers, hypotension, and shortness of breath. Suspected of a tick-borne infection, the woman was tested for malaria and babesia, however these blood ..read more

Simon Fraser University,  Jeff Hodson (04.11.24) reports, “Ant pheromones may help protect hikers and campers from ticks.” Researchers from Simon Fraser University found that ant pheromones used as a topical repellent, or as an environmental barrier, may protect people from tick bites. The study showed that specific pheromones from ants, even when ants were removed from the area, caused ticks to avoid the surfaces where ants had been.  The team’s decision to investigate ants was based on a paper published in Royal Society Open Science (2024). This paper evaluated predators that blac ..read more