posted
1. As I understand, a vaccination is sample of the actual disease in a nonvirulent state. Damaged so that it can not take full effect. People who have been vaccinated introduce the disease in it's damaged state and our immune system produced antibodies specific to kill off the disease. Why then can people who had Lyme - get reinfected?
2. Knowing what we know about Lyme, do you have confidence in the vaccination. Would you recommend it to family and friends?
OOOOPs - I have one more question.
3. Why couldn't we benefit from a vaccination. If our own immune system has difficulty tracking and identifying the Lyme DNA, why wouldn't a vaccination provide this information for our bodies to generate the specific antibodies to fight the real thing?
Reading the book, "Beating Lyme" - very interesting
Peedie
[ 16. July 2008, 02:22 PM: Message edited by: Peedie ]
Posts: 641 | From So. CA | Registered: May 2008
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Keebler
Honored Contributor (25K+ posts)
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posted
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Well, I'm not brainy, but I wondered what sort of question would that would be.
If I were brainy, I'd pull together all the quotes and citations - and if I had energy - but here's from what I've read:
If a person gets lyme today they can become reinfected any number of times from subsequent exposures.
the vaccine (for lyme) a few years back had serious flaws and made many people very ill.
a vaccine for lyme is not currently on the market.
Any future vaccine for lyme would likely not consider the co-infections that can be as serious as lyme itself. Therefore, the problems of testing and treating would still be very complex.
Mercury is in many vaccines. that alone can cause serious problems.
AND - in light of the recent horrible results from the lyme vaccine I certainly will not be lining up for one if it comes along.
And, if or when it does, my guess is they will neglect to consider the co-infections and all the 300 different strains of borrelia.
To fight the "real thing" as you put it - well, it would be nearly impossible to know what that might be, exactly. A vaccine for one strain would not protect against another - or one that has morphed and mutated.
And, as not to sound totally defeatist, I don't think we should stop trying to figure out how to prevent this, but so much has gone unattended in regards to other measures that it is a sin, really.
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[ 15. July 2008, 05:27 PM: Message edited by: Keebler ]
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lpkayak
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posted
oops-i'm not brainy...more like brain dead.
OMG-i hope i haven't missed something. i hope there is not another lyme vaccine out there. if there is DON'T TAKE IT. at least until you have really studied what is going on.
there was one. it did horrible things to people. mostly very healthy, strong people who wanted to make sure they didn't get lyme and become disabled. they became very disabled with no cure.
i cannot talk science and medical on here-someone else will have to come along and do that.
the research is there.
i just know what happened to people i know who took it.
the one thing i remember is about 30% of the population will have a really bad reaction to it. i think it's a gene thing.
-------------------- Lyme? Its complicated. Educate yourself. Posts: 13712 | From new england | Registered: Feb 2004
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lpkayak
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posted
i do wonder about the vaccine for dogs and is there one for horses?
my vet insisted the dog vaccine was good and didn't have the problems the people vaccine had
i used it on my schnauzers for 4 years...i trusted her. the last time (the one who is alive is 10 now) they both got paralyzed from the waist down for 24 hrs
no more lyme vaccine for them. just neem and biospot.
-------------------- Lyme? Its complicated. Educate yourself. Posts: 13712 | From new england | Registered: Feb 2004
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adamm
Unregistered
posted
From what I've read, it has to do in large part with the phenomenon
of antigenic variation. Our immune system identifies the pathogen
by the specific array of proteins exhibited on its surface.
Bb, however, has the ability to continually change this
configuration, making our immune cells unable to recognize
and thus dispose of it. A vaccine would only be able
to prime our systems to attack those Bb whose "antigenic
fingerprints", if
you will, match those of the damaged bacteria being delivered.
Add this to the fact that the antibodies produced in
response to the innoculation will actually attack the tissues
of about 20-30% of the population (those
with the infamous HLA-DR4 gene), whose cells contain
proteins nearly identical to Borrelia's OSP-A, and you've
got plenty of reason to avoid any Lyme vaccine offered to
Good picture of a EM bullseye. The aritcle itself is full of misinformation. Such as Lyme being localized in Northern California. Leads one to think it is only in Northern Calif. Also that 80% of people exposed get the EM rash.
No, there is no Lyme vaccination for horses - I was trying to find one too! But now - I don't know if that would be a good idea!
Peedie
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Keebler
Honored Contributor (25K+ posts)
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posted
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They mention. LYMErix - that's the vaccine that had to be pulled off the market.
Can't help but wonder what made them think they could develop an effective vaccine in the first place.
Best of Health Peedie
Posts: 641 | From So. CA | Registered: May 2008
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Angelica
Unregistered
posted
Phyllis Balch, CNC keeps giving out bad information about the vaccine for Lyme in her more recent books. She thinks the vaccine is still on the market. She also sometimes mentions there are a lot of false positives in Lyme testing and that many people who think they have LD have something else.
I use to think she was intelligent and now I wonder why her editor is not catching the fact that they are printing misinformation and confusing numerous readers with their nonsense.
quote:Originally posted by Peedie: Can't help but wonder what made them think they could develop an effective vaccine in the first place.
They DIDN'T!! They just wanted the MONEY!!!
Yes, that was a great explanation, Adam!
Angelica...Who does this Balch person write for??
-------------------- --Lymetutu-- Opinions, not medical advice! Posts: 96222 | From Texas | Registered: Feb 2001
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Angelica
Unregistered
posted
She and her ex husband (he is a MD) have both written numerous books on health.
The one I have floating around here at the moment claims to be America's #1 Guide to Natural Health. The title is Prescription for Nutritional Healing. They both have written lots of other books which are sold a lot at health food stores.
I have one friend that read what Phyllis had to say on false positive testing for Lyme and became rather confused with her Igenex positive test results and doubted them and her LLMD for a bit. It is really confusing for people new to Lyme.
I know I trusted my family doctors with their negative unreliable testing for far too many years. They could not read the lab results either.
Phyllis Balch is just adding to the confusion about getting tested and diagnosed. Not to mention she mentions in her recent books that people can get a Lyme disease vaccination.
I see her and her ex husband's books everywhere. I even was handed one for free from the Vitamin Shoppe when I purchased some vitamins at their store.
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Keebler
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posted
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A 1990 copy of Prescription for Nutritional Healing is ISBN 0-89529-429-X
that will lead you to their publisher --- but, ohhhh. it says right here:
"Avery Publishing Group" Garden City Park, New York
James F. Balch, Jr., M.D. and Phyllis A. Balch, C.N.C.
no contact info. in my copy but this may be enough to go on if someone has the energy to set out on a correction mission.
13 years Lyme & Co.; Small Fiber Neuropathy; Myasthenia Gravis, Adrenal Insufficiency. On chemo for 2 1/2 years as experimental treatment for MG. Posts: 4480 | From Northeastern Connecticut | Registered: Jun 2005
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Angelica
Unregistered
posted
I may need to order some bee venom first before I attempt any sort of correction mission but who knows I may just get a burst of energy some time soon.
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Angelica
Unregistered
posted
I just sent the publishers an email and here is their email address if anyone else would like to send them another one.
There is actually a lot of really good information in her books and her ex husband's too but their Lyme disease sections need vast improvement to even be in reality. I met James Balch MD before and he is a very nice person.
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bettyg
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posted
peedie suggestion,
suggest you add LYME VACCINE to your topic title by clicking on pencil/paper which opens up subject and you can state you want opinions about NEW LYME VACCINE if it came out....
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shazdancer
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 1436
posted
Peedie, they may have modified the website recently, but this particular article is definitely old. It refers to the IDSA guidelines of 2000 -- they were updated in 2006, and the newer ones are going to be formally reviewed, due to bias on the part of the writers.
Lymerix is touted in this article as a new vaccine, though it was taken off the market years ago in the wake of multiple lawsuits and people shying away from it.
There is currently no vaccine available for humans in the US.
Hope that helps you.
-- Shaz
Posts: 1558 | From the Berkshires | Registered: Jul 2001
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lpkayak
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 5230
posted
last year-07, i saw a flyer for lymrix in our health department-right out there for the public to see and take and make them think lyme's not that big a problem...just take the vaccine and you'll be fine...like measles or mumps...
i told the person in charge and she said-oh, we're too busy to keep this updated...they did take them down...
but how many other health departments and doc offices have these flyers around????
-------------------- Lyme? Its complicated. Educate yourself. Posts: 13712 | From new england | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
I just read the vaccine chapter to Cure Unknown which by the way I strongly recommend to everyone.
Just to clarify, the Lymerix vaccine developed by Glaxo was not an attenuated bacetria, but rather a specific Bb outer surface protein, OspA.
Therefore it can only induce production of antibodies to that specific protein, which is not present in all of the forms of Bb found in humans.
However, in ticks, most of the Bb bacteria did contain the OspA protein.
The idea was that the antibodies would enter the tick and kill the Bb before it had a chance to infect the human.
What should be noted is that there are several strains of Bb that do not contain the OspA protein and there is still a window of oppurtunity of infection if the antibodies don't kill the Bb in time.
Regarding safety and adverse reactions, you could not pay me enough money to take this thing.
What should be noted is that while the OspA vaccine was being developed by Glaxo and our dear friend Alan Steere, Steere was simultanously proposing that OspA may trigger autoimmune reactions in some people through molecular mimicry.
In other words he was saying that the active ingredient in his vaccine also happened to be the triggering factor for "post lyme syndrome"!
The people that were particularly vulnerable to this autoimmune reaction were people with the HLA-DR4 gene.
The results were that many people who took the vaccine did develop an autoimmune reaction and it also apparently reactivated previous dormant infections of Lyme.
I am not sure how it reactivated the Lyme, but apparently there were cases where antibiotics were successful.
Hope that helps.
If you want me to explain how the vaccine impacts testing I would be glad to do so.
-------------------- I was diagnosed with and treated for late stage Lyme in 1991 with 6 weeks of doxycycline. Initially felt better, but then developed health problems that last until today. Posts: 83 | From New Jersey | Registered: May 2008
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Angelica
Unregistered
posted
UC California's website mentions the Lyme disease vaccine too but they forget to mention it is no longer on the market. I just emailed them and asked them to correct that fact.
"A vaccine to protect against Lyme disease was approved for human use in December 1998.
However, the vaccine is registered for use only by individuals 15 to 70 years of age, it is about 76% effective after three doses, and it does not afford protection against other tick-borne diseases.
In addition, the spirochetes are quite diverse in California, and research is underway to determine if more than one kind of spirochete can infect people.
For these reasons, vaccinated individuals should continue to employ personal protective measures whenever they venture outdoors."
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posted
I guess I used to be brainy though I didn't know a thing about the medical field back in those days. Probably not worth the trade-off living with this oh-so endearing brain fog, but with how interested I've become in health and medical science and related issues, I couldn't see myself without these interests currently. Anyway, just wanted to add a couple things as I've spent my fair share of time researching vaccines and whatnot the past couple years.
1.) Different types of vaccines exist including ones that contain a form of the given virus in either a live (attenuated) or an inactivated state. At the least, vaccines with the live form of a virus can cause people to become ill with the same symptomatic presentations in varying degrees as the illness being vaccinated for.
I don't have enough of an understanding of what the inactivatating/killing of a virus/bacteria for a vaccine entails so I don't know if a person can become sick as a direct result of an infection from an inactivated one. Though I do know plenty of people who essentially came down with the flu after receiving a flu shot, which falls under this umbrella. Furthermore, immune responses and various factors being upregulated or downregulated happen with any type of vaccine, dead or alive.
Also, while the intention of administering a vaccine is for a person's immune system to develop antibodies to a given antigen and consequently, immunity against the corresponding virus/bacteria, a person can still be infected with the virus/bacteria for a variety of reasons. The virus may simply be too overwhelming for a person's immune system to handle adequately even with the antibodies already present. Or the antibodies may not be specific enough to a mutated form of the virus or another species strain, for instance.
As for people getting re-infected with lyme, I'd think there are numerous aspects which may come into play though this is mostly conjecture on my part. If a person is currently healthy and had a previous lyme infection that was adequately treated and essentially eliminated, then I'm inclined to think that person's immune system would be more likely to fight off a re-infection than a person whose immune system is compromised or still dealing with a lyme infection.
There are also various strains, and certain antibodies developed as a response to a specific strain may not correlate to another strain, which could then consequently move and multiply throughout the body until the immune system detects its presence. Additionally, it may simply be the case that the lyme bacteria is particularly difficult for most peoples' immune systems to handle on its own even with the antibodies to the specific bacteria already being present and the bacteria being detected soon after entering the body.
2.) Definitely not, though I don't think one is currently available in this country anyway as has been stated previously in this thread.
[ 17. July 2008, 03:32 PM: Message edited by: Charlienj ]
Posts: 43 | From NJ | Registered: May 2007
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Thanks so much for the thorough (and brainy)explaination. I think what you say and speculate makes a lot of sense.
I think you explained the "reinfect" possibility very well.
I have not had a flu vac for years - even with my mom insisting. I am one of the ones who always got the flu after the vac. PCP always said "Must be a different strain".
Best of Health Peedie
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