a Small Percent of Active Forms, and Other Lyme Forms —
an Issue Top Expert Lyme Specialists Should Know
(LLMDs and ILADS Doctors)
Antibiotic therapy [dose? duration?] with penicillin, doxycycline, and ceftriaxone has proven to be effective for the treatment of Lyme borreliosis. [Sunning? Dropping inflammation? Killing with no debris?]
In some patients, however, it was noticed that borreliae can survive in the tissues in spite of seemingly adequate therapy. [Pathologist Alan MacDonald found Lyme in over half of 12 Harvard’s Alzheimer’s patients’ deceased brains].
… we investigated the different modes of degeneration of Borrelia burgdorferi suspensions during exposure to various antibiotics. By dark-field microscopy and ultrastructural investigations,
increasing blebbing,
and the gradual formation of granular and cystic structures could be followed during the exposure time.
Although antibiotic concentrations at levels at which 90% of organisms are inhibited after 72 h…
80% or [more] motile organisms were still present after incubation with penicillin and doxycycline.
By transmission electron microscopy, intact spirochetal parts, mostly situated in cysts, were seen up to 96 h after exposure with all three antibiotics tested.
According to experiences from studies with other spirochetes, it is suggested that encysted borreliae, granules, and the remaining blebs might be responsible for the ongoing antigenic stimulus leading to complaints of chronic Lyme borreliosis.
Kersten A, Poitschek C, Rauch S, Aberer E.
Effects of penicillin, ceftriaxone, and doxycycline on morphology of Borrelia burgdorferi.
Antimicrob Agents Chemother. 1995 May;39(5):1127–33.
doi: 10.1128/AAC.39.5.1127
PMID: 7625800; PMCID: PMC162695.
Elsewhere on this site, we list over 600 papers supporting persisting Lyme after routine doxy or amoxy treatment.