Not sure I know how I want to respond to your questions.
Let me be the first to say "Use the search".
Since Borrelia needs a host to survive, in that sense it is a parasite. However, one would then have to classify the Syphillis spirochete bacterium, of which Borrelia is a close cousin, as a parasite.
As to sexual transmission, live Borrelia spirochetes have been discovered in practically all human tissue and fluids. They have also been found in a wide variety of biting bugs ie., fleas, mosquitos, mites, biting flies, bed bugs etc. as well as in the saliva of wild snakes and lizards, and also in standing water and African dust..... not just ticks.
The debate on actual transmission through sexual contact and/or the exchange of bodily fluids is almost as contentious as the alledged controversy over Chronic Lyme infection itself.
However some fairly technical research (cited below) suggests that a person must be bitten to become infected.
"Microbial adhesion to and colonization of host tissue is an early, critical event in an infection process.
In the case of Lyme disease, host tissue adherence appears to be of importance during different stages of the disease process.
Initially, during an infected tick's blood meal, a small number of spirochetes are deposited in the dermis of the host, where the bacteria appear to colonize collagen fibers (4, 5).
As the infection disseminates to other tissues, bacteria may colonize additional extracellular matrix structures, and host cells may be involved.
We previously showed that adherence of B. burgdorferi to collagen fibers involved a specific binding of the spirochete to decorin, a dermatan sulfate proteoglycan that is associated with and "decorates" collagen fibers, whereas a direct binding to collagen could not be demonstrated (6-9). A dermal route of entry into the host appears to be important for the development of disease.
Spirochetes administered intravenously are rapidly and effectively cleared by Kupffer cells in the liver (10), whereas those inoculated intradermally consistently establish infection (11).
Perhaps the initial dermal colonization allows the organism to adapt to in vivo conditions before blood stream dissemination."
Posts: 294 | From nevada | Registered: Sep 2005
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I can only address the sexual transmittal portion of your question. This issue is controversial but I know first hand of two couples that transmitted it to the other and several second hand stories that are the same.
Some were male to female, others female to male. I'm not sure if it's been studied extensively, but the anecdotal evidence seems to say "yes", at least in some cases but obviously not all.
Tim
Posts: 52 | From California | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Scott, you're amazing. You know so much. How long have you been studying LD? Ewok
Posts: 33 | From Florida | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
Bb is a parasite. It has almost no machinery for synthesizing its own metabolic intermediates. Really it is the ultimate parasite. I call them "ineradicable microworms".
Posts: 523 | From Stillwater,OK,USA | Registered: Sep 2004
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SForsgren
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 7686
posted
I have been studying Lyme only sice diagnosed in July 2005 after eight years of misdiagnosis. I spend at least a couple of hours a day.... Thanks for the kind words.
As to the comment by Aligonda, I do not believe this is correct. It is not generally classified as a parasite. It is more correctly classified as a bacterium.
-------------------- Be well, Scott Posts: 4617 | From San Jose, CA | Registered: Jul 2005
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treepatrol
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 4117
posted
quote:Originally posted by welcome: Wow!
Since Borrelia needs a host to survive, in that sense it is a parasite. However, one would then have to classify the Syphillis spirochete bacterium, of which Borrelia is a close cousin, as a parasite.
Iam not sure because of blebs and cyst form to survive may have to be rethought?
How long does a bleb Last outside a body or the cyst forms Lida Mattman has some very interesting things she's written Maybe they just need the right fluid to reconstitute?? Look at Leptospirosis, also known colloquially as canicola fever, hemorrhagic jaundice, infectious jaundice, mud fever, spirochetal jaundice, swamp fever, swineherd's disease, caver's flu or sewerman's flu, is a bacterial infection resulting from exposure to the Leptospira interrogans bacterium. Or
Moayad insists the culture technique developed by Dr. Mattman is a very reliable culture for this bacteria, a technique he says took her 5 to 6 years to come up with, and he's confident it will be reproduced soon.
Other experts can't understand how the Lyme bacteria could still persist in the blood of patients who have been aggressively treated with antibiotics for months, even years. The answer may lie in a very important idea that surrounds the work of Phillips and colleagues: disease-causing bacteria may be able to transform themselves into something that's resistant to standard treatment and invisible to the body's immune system.
Dr. Moayad says the Lyme bacteria may take a form different than the usual coiled spiral shape characteristic of the spirochete family to which it belongs. There's a lot of evidence, especially from the older syphilis literature, that suggests spirochetes - (syphilis is caused by a spirochete, like Lyme) can form what are called "cysts", containing tiny granules that may form the basis for new "daughter" spirochetes.
The discoverer of the Lyme-causing spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi is Willy Burgdorfer, after whom the spirochete is named. Dr. Burgdorfer, a microbiologist and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Spirochetal & Tick-Borne Diseases, gave the keynote address at the New York conference - The Complexity of Vector-borne Spirochetes (Borrelia spp) - which explored the idea of spirochete cysts "hiding" in the human body. Burgdorfer notes this was once called "granulation theory" and was considered as the organism's mode of reproduction. He's not sure whether the cyst forms represent a true propagative mechanism, but he is confident they represent a complex defense mechanism of the organism in a human host.
Asked what implications this way of looking at spirochetes has for the diagnosis of Lyme disease, Burgdorfer says "It's probably the answer for the difficulties we have in diagnosing Lyme and other spirochetal diseases, in that we can demonstrate these cysts by microscopy, and once they are in the tissues of the patient, we can no longer detect them. It is quite possible that this material that we cannot see by microscopy is responsible for producing prolonged and chronic disease."
Burgdorfer is asked whether he's seen the Phillips paper, which purports to have reliably identified this same "cyst" - or "bleb" material, as it's called - from the blood of late-stage Lyme patients. He hasn't seen it, but when shown a copy, responds immediately: "This is exactly what I'm talking about".
He points to the electron microscope photographs included in the paper . "Here you see blebs, and these are shed by the mother spirochetes, and they are thought the germinative units out of which the daughter spirochetes develop. I personally believe that the significance of these blebs as the agent responsible for prolonged and chronic disease is very important, and it may be the answer to the diagnosis of these chronic diseases such as Lyme disease - because that's what we are looking for: something that produces diseases long after the initial treatment, and then relapse occurs after several months - or years - and the question is: where did this relapse come from? Well, it may come from these surviving crystals or bleb material that is in the tissue, and it stays there until the antibiotic or immune pressure is gone, and then when the conditions are right for its further development, they develop into typical spirochetes again."
It is very difficult, he says, to see these blebs or these morphologically atypical spirochetes microscopically in tissues. "You don't see a typical long spirochete - all you see is granules, and atypical material, and to demonstrate that this is actively living material is very difficult."
Dr. Burgdorfer and I proceed back to the conference, where we bump into Moayad, one of the co-authors of the Phillips paper. Burgdorfer reminds him the notion of a spirochetal life cycle was first proposed in the syphilis literature long ago, which described how the syphilis organism
(Treponema pallidum, left) is not only present as a classical, beautiful spirochetal structure but it may also adopt "cyst-like" forms (right). Liegner notes "one couldn't even recognize these as having anything to do with syphilis or spirochetes unless one had made a very detailed study of the nature of the syphilis organism in tissues under various conditions."
heres a funny thought seamonkeys??
I know you probaly know this just thought I would put it out there for thought.
-------------------- Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Remember Iam not a Doctor Just someone struggling like you with Tick Borne Diseases.
quote:Originally posted by Aligondo Bruce: Bb is a parasite. It has almost no machinery for synthesizing its own metabolic intermediates. Really it is the ultimate parasite. I call them "ineradicable microworms".
You really need to copywrite that phrase imho.
Posts: 731 | From Humble,TX | Registered: Feb 2005
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quote:Originally posted by SForsgren: I have been studying Lyme only sice diagnosed in July 2005 after eight years of misdiagnosis. I spend at least a couple of hours a day.... Thanks for the kind words.
As to the comment by Aligonda, I do not believe this is correct. It is not generally classified as a parasite. It is more correctly classified as a bacterium.
I'm not trying to get into an argument with anyone, or prove anyone wrong, or anything like that...but many, many scientists, microbiologists, bacteriologists, etc., including sherwood casjens and others who sequenced the Bb genome, refer to Bb as an "obligate parasite" in their publications. It's a bacteria, of course {a very DIFFERENT bacteria}...but here "parasite" is used to describe the metabolic machinery, or lack thereof. You may be thinking of 'parasite' in a macro sense, eg, helminths {tapeworms} and the like...but Bb, once again, is very parasitic in its way of life...I'm not sure there is any strictly scientific classification of "parasite" versus "non-parasite". it's a word used to denote a means of existence.
and what's most interesting about Bb is that it is a "parasite" ie it synthesizes very little of its own biomolecules, rather, it steals at all levels from its host...and it has a tendency to reduce its human hosts to the same sort of existence. we are becoming it. sometimes I wonder if I am even human anymore, or if my mind has also been taken over by this organism. we are phantoms. we are demons. we are possessed.
Posts: 523 | From Stillwater,OK,USA | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Aligondo Bruce: Bb is a parasite. It has almost no machinery for synthesizing its own metabolic intermediates. Really it is the ultimate parasite. I call them "ineradicable microworms".
You really need to copywrite that phrase imho.
come on, brent...that's something ALLEN STEERE would do!
Posts: 523 | From Stillwater,OK,USA | Registered: Sep 2004
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JimBoB
Unregistered
posted
The Lb Spirochete should to be considered an intermediate life form somewhere between the simple bacterias and the more complicated parasites.
But because it Cannot generate it's own nucleotides, amino acids, fatty acids and enzyme cofactors, but MUST scavenge them from its hosts, it MUST be primarily considered as parasitic.
That is the main reason they canNOT live in the wild, but MUST have a host. Unfortunately, they, like bacteria, are able to CHANGE their structure and hide from our immune systems AND other detection.
They also do this rapid rearranging of their gene structure so they can ADAPT to their HUMAN hosts. As normally they live better in animals like dogs.
And, YES, Lb Spirochetes have also been found in fleas, mosquitos, biting flies and mites.
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