posted
Once in a while a writer gets it right! Please read the following article from the Luck, Wisconsin Enterprise.
If you get a chance, click on the link below to send an email thankyou to Lynda Berg for her article. Type in "Lynda Berg" or "Lyme disease article" in the subject box. Notes, cards, or letters wouldn't hurt either!
A few words of thanks can make someone's day and letting her know this article is being read across the country can be more recognition than she can ever imagine.
By the way, Lynda Berg told me that she feels the media has a responsibility to the public to write the truth. If only all writers were committed to accurate reporting!
We've got to praise good Lyme writing wherever it's found, but here in the seat of Lyme disease hostility, the importance and impact of this article can't be underestimated.
Lyme Disease: an expose on a terrifying epidemic By Lynda C. Berg
While very few people in this neck of the woods are unfamiliar with Lyme disease, a tick-borne illness that is sweeping the country at epidemic proportions, diagnosis is still sketchy, at best.
The presentation of the highly acclaimed, multi-award-winning film, Under Our Skin, at the Luck Library/Museum last Thursday night, was a wake-up call of extreme proportions, full of frightening statistics.
The film follows seven subjects whose stories of physical and emotional pain, and astronomical expense involved in diagnosis (or, more aptly, the lack thereof) are simply horrifying.
A main thrust of the film is in exposing the corruption of the medical system, at the behest of insurance companies. The 103-minute film is the result of four years of work and 375 hours of footage.
One of the scariest statistics is that the Centers for Disease Control admit that more than 200,000 people may acquire Lyme disease each year (more than AIDS, West Nile Virus and Avian Flu combined), making it the fastest growing infectious disease in the country. The big problem is that tens of thousands of people go undiagnosed.
Lyme disease is difficult to test for accurately. It is caused by the bite of an infected deer tick with the Lyme-causing spiral-shaped bacteria, Borrelia burgdorferi, similar to the microorganism that causes syphilis.
According to a recent John Hopkins study, the testing procedure for Lyme misses 75 percent of positive Lyme cases. For this reason, tests should play only a supportive role in diagnosis. Up to 59 percent of Lyme cases do not present with the ``bullseye'' rash and even 14 - 21 day antibiotic treatment results in a 26 to 50 percent failure rate.
Transmission of Lyme disease can also happen in utero from an infected mother to a fetus through the placenta during pregnancy. This can apparently cause stillbirth and other complications.
It is also believed (though not conclusively proven at this point) that Lyme can be transmitted sexually.
Early symptoms of Lyme can include fever, headache, fatigue and sometimes the ``bullseye'' skin rash. As the disease progresses, symptoms can include joint inflammation, a stiff neck, sleep problems, shooting pains, numbness or tingling in hands and/or feet, and problems with concentration and short term memory.
Many if not most Lyme cases are misdiagnosed. The film really brought this point home. One subject was told, ``There's no medicine for someone like you.'' She was told that she was just looking for attention. This was not an isolated incidence.
Many subjects with Lyme are thought of as simply lazy. Some of the most common misdiagnoses include: chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, autism, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson's and ALS.
Several doctors' journeys with Lyme disease were also chronicled in the film. One doctor, a pathologist at a regional hospital in Long Island, New York, has been researching the disease out of his makeshift laboratory in his basement for the last 25 years. That research shows connections between Lyme disease and neurodegenerative disease, as well as the role of maternal-fetal transmission.
Others, advocating the long-term antibiotic approach, while successful with patients, have been literally forced out of practice by insurance companies like Blue Cross/Blue Shield, who filed suit to recoup fees paid for what they called ``unauthorized treatment.''
Marina Andrews, leader of the Western Wisconsin Lyme Action Group, (who also sponsored the screening of Under Our Skin Thursday night), cautioned, ``A lot of patients when they get on antibiotic therapy for Lyme disease get worse before they get better.''
Andrews said some patients get very frightened [by increased or new symptoms]and then stop their treatment. She stated that this is a reaction that has been noted since 1895, when they tried to treat people with syphilis, another spirochete bacteria, like Lyme disease. ``Anyone with Lyme disease should be warned about that,'' she said.
Ledger Publications 105 Main Street P.O. Box 129 Balsam Lake, WI 54810 715-485-3121 phone 715-485-3037 fax [email protected]
Publishers of the Polk County Ledger, St. Croix Falls Standard Press, Luck Enterprise Press and The Laker
Posts: 422 | From Luck home | Registered: Sep 2005
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I just called and [email protected] is the right email addy. I don't know how to highlight it in blue so people can respond.
So glad you liked the article!
Can someone help?
Posts: 422 | From Luck home | Registered: Sep 2005
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richedie
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 14689
posted
Needs to be in every paper nation wide.
-------------------- Mepron/Zith/Ceftin Doxy/Biaxin/Flagyl pulse. Artemisinin with Doxy/Biaxin. Period of Levaquin and Ceftin. Then Levaquin, Bactrim and Biaxin. Bactrim/Augmentin/Rifampin. Mepron/Biaxin/Artemisinin/Cat's Claw Rifampin/Bactrim/Alinia Plaquenil/Biaxin Posts: 1949 | From Pennsylvania | Registered: Feb 2008
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richedie
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 14689
posted
Needs to be in every paper nationwide!
-------------------- Mepron/Zith/Ceftin Doxy/Biaxin/Flagyl pulse. Artemisinin with Doxy/Biaxin. Period of Levaquin and Ceftin. Then Levaquin, Bactrim and Biaxin. Bactrim/Augmentin/Rifampin. Mepron/Biaxin/Artemisinin/Cat's Claw Rifampin/Bactrim/Alinia Plaquenil/Biaxin Posts: 1949 | From Pennsylvania | Registered: Feb 2008
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posted
Thanks! I did send it to Open Eye. I should probably send them the actual article with photos and all. Maybe they can scan it in. What do you think?
Please help keep this up. So few writers call a spade a spade in Lyme.
How many sprinkle their commentary with words like epidemic, frightening, etc?
Posts: 422 | From Luck home | Registered: Sep 2005
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richedie
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 14689
posted
quote:Originally posted by mjo: Thanks richedie. Do you think I should send it to Open Eye?
What is Open Eye?
-------------------- Mepron/Zith/Ceftin Doxy/Biaxin/Flagyl pulse. Artemisinin with Doxy/Biaxin. Period of Levaquin and Ceftin. Then Levaquin, Bactrim and Biaxin. Bactrim/Augmentin/Rifampin. Mepron/Biaxin/Artemisinin/Cat's Claw Rifampin/Bactrim/Alinia Plaquenil/Biaxin Posts: 1949 | From Pennsylvania | Registered: Feb 2008
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posted
We have a cabin not far from Luck where I got a tick bite with a rash almost 2 years ago - it was probably not a first bite(been sick for 25 years).
I'm amazed when I talk to people in the area I get comments like, "It's just Lyme, Elichiosis, etc. Doc gave me, my son, a prescription now we are fine!"
This is literally Tick heaven in WI! I'm glad that it is in the paper so more people will hopefully believe there is more to Lyme.
At a local church this winter they had a prayer request time. It is a very small country church - maybe a hundred people. Two people had had pacemakers put in the previous week, and a couple more asked for prayer for relatives with heart electrical issues.
I have mentioned chronic Lyme etc. to several people but I don't think it registers. Yea for the article!
-------------------- "His faithful love endures forever." Psalm 136 Posts: 189 | From MN | Registered: Dec 2007
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Yup. It's like talking to the moon here in Wisconsin. So much denial and hostility, you cannot imagine. . .
Our meeting notices are continually taken down from bulletin boards all around the area even though they have a bright sticker attached to them that says, "Please leave posted permanently! Thanks."
The St. Croix River Valley is Ground Zero for Lyme disease and co-infections, yet I bet 99% of doctors here have never even heard of Bartonella or Babesia.
Funny how Lyme was studied in Wisconsin in the early days but now it's a "disappeared disease."
Some people do get well when treated right away, but those who don't often don't relate lingering symptoms to Lyme and their doctors sure aren't going to mention that the problems they have are from PERSISTENT LYME DISEASE INFECTION! (After all we've been told point blank that they can "get in trouble" for treating Lyme disease.)
I just spent the morning printing medical abstracts for a woman (from a local church) whose husband is now wheelchair-bound with Congestive Heart Failure (CHF) after having Lyme disease six months ago. The cardiologist told her "Lyme can't do that to the heart."
I've seen cardiologists in Wisconsin and Minnesota. Lyme isn't in the realm of possibility for their "practice" of medicine.
Posts: 422 | From Luck home | Registered: Sep 2005
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Tincup
Honored Contributor (10K+ posts)
Member # 5829
posted
Excellent article.
The kind that has the Worm digging further underground after seeing it!
Betty note: I tried printing out the chart, but it goes SIDEWAYS, and tried printing in pages 1, 2, 3; it kept printing page 1 only! So just a warning if others try to do this; use your PRINT REVIEW FIRST which I did, and indicated DIFFERENT pages, but still got page 1 only! I gave up after 8 tries! uffda
Lynda, thanks for going and for writing publicly about lyme disease and all you learned from this very educational dvd!
Wisc. is prime for ticks and in top 10 states! Iowa was no. 15 in 2005 statistics!!
Best wishes to Wisconsin residents to learn the symptoms for lyme, DRESS to prevent them, and have their young kids wearing SHOES AND SOCKS when outside especially in the summer.
It's not worth their health to get this God-awful, dibilitating disease that sometimes goes on for years.
I've had chronic lyme 39 years; 34.5 MISDIAGNOSED by 40-50 drs!! So many things wrong with my body it isn't even funny!!
posted
So, use these brackets [email] [/email] like this?
I was so excited to see that you had put the link addy to Lynda Berg at the Luck Enterprise that I didn't read the rest of your post until I got back to you Back here! Thanks!
Posts: 422 | From Luck home | Registered: Sep 2005
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