Lyme Disease Myths

Lyme Disease Info

In the case of diseases, the spread of false knowledge can be life-impinging if not threatening. With twenty thousand reported cases of Lyme disease in 2004 – who knows how many unreported – and the insidious nature of its tick carriers, there is impetus for a dearth of information about the disease and much is available online and off.

Patients come to their physicians confident in their own knowledge, accurate or inaccurate as it may be. More often than, they fall prey to myths about Lyme disease like these that follow.

Myth #1: Any tick can carry the bacteria B. burgdorferi and ticks attached for more than twenty-four hours indicate sure infection.

There is no documented instance of ticks outside the genus Ixodes carrying the disease and while the highest risk is for ticks attached for extended periods of time, the general risk of infection is 1-3%.

Myth #2: Tick bites should routinely be treated with preventative antibiotics.

Since in the majority of cases the disease is easily treated if it develops at all, this is an unnecessary and futile approach.

Myth #3: Diagnosis maybe subjective and not based on serology (blood work).

In early stages of Lyme disease, blood work is not needed for a diagnosis, nor will they be reliable because the antibody levels are too low. The erythema migrans (EM) rash alone is evidence enough for a confident diagnosis. In later stages, blood work is reliable. Other bodily fluids such as urine do not offer reliable test results.

Myth #4: Chronic Lyme disease is common and caused by a persistent infection of B. burgdorferi.

In patients who experience chronic problems after Lyme disease, no bacterial infection has been found after the initial infection is eliminated. Furthermore, additional antibiotics have no effect on patient condition. Chronic symptoms experienced after Lyme disease have never been proven to be related to Lyme disease.

Myth #5: There are many documented cases of enduring congenital Lyme disease even when the mother undergoes treatment while pregnant.

Many mothers worry about the effects of treatment on the fetus, but there have been no cases of treatment harming the fetus and all cases of congenital Lyme disease clear shortly after birth. Mothers who refuse treatment put their children at higher risk of serious infection. Indeed, there are documented cases of babies dying shortly after birth apparently from B. burgdorferi infection.

Myth #6: Lyme disease may be transmitted by blood transfusions, physical contact, breast milk, etc.

While B. burgdorferi has been found to be capable of living in blood samples, no person infected with Lyme disease is allowed to donate blood according to medical procedures. Breast milk has never been found to sustain the bacteria and, like physical contact, no transmission in this manner has been documented.