Why Do Infectious Disease "Experts"
Ignore Tick Co-Infections?
Dr. Benjamin Rush, signer of the Declaration of Independence
I treat patients from all over the USA, and typically they have failed local sincere physicians. I am often surprised that a person is evaluated for Lyme in a very high exposure area, and the only testing done is lazy laboratory medicine, without any thought of the wide array of Lyme symptoms. Physicians too often depend on the clearly failed ELISA and Western Blot tests done at junk labs. These physicians assume exceptional antibody production, and that their exists an excellent and very cheap Lyme test. But Lyme has over 20 ways to make these common tests come out as false negatives.
Often I see administrative "experts" say someone has no Lyme. Of course they do not fix the person. They just mock the treatment and motives of others, and merely allow them to suffer and occasionally to die at a later date from strokes, heart attacks and cancer--from clotting and a depressed immune system, routinely a part of late chronic Lyme.
If you feel I am too dramatic, here is a sample of a co-infection missed and leading to death. Why do the "experts" not test for co-infections? Infections like Bartonella with its massive psychiatric symptoms, Babesia that can kill and cause fatigue and sweats, or Ehrlichia described below.
A Fatality from Ehrlichiosis in a 44-year-old Man
Human cases of infection with a granulocytotropic Ehrlichia species closely related to Ehrlichia equi are now being described with increasing frequency in the United States, especially in areas where Lyme disease is already endemic. We describe a case of fatal pancarditis during the course of human granulocytic ehrlichiosis (HGE) in a 44-year-old outdoor worker who was previously treated for presumptive Lyme disease. Serological and molecular diagnostic tests for Borrelia burgdorferi and Babesia microti infections were negative. Postmortem serum specimens were seroreactive for HGE, and molecular evidence of infection with the HGE agent was obtained. These findings suggest that carditis may be a manifestation of HGE, further complicating the differential diagnosis of tick-borne illness.
Jahangir A, Kolbert C, Edwards W, Mitchell P, Dumler JS, Persing DH. Fatal pancarditis associated with human granulocytic Ehrlichiosis in a 44-year-old man. Clin Infect Dis. 1998 Dec;27(6):1424-7. Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, Mayo Clinic
To Your Health!
Dr. J
