What you are not aware of is that the Steere camp regularly infiltrate our boards in order to hurt and disrupt the Lyme patients' movement, asking questions and posing as real patients. Asking on another board means nothing - a Steere camp provocateur would know that he/she would very soon be referred to a Lyme board, and that would help to give an air of legitimacy.

You say that "MichelleP" had never heard of Kathleen Dickson, nor even of Steere? Well, shortly after arriving at sci-med she was insulting Kathleen, and arguing against Kathleen's post in which Kathleen had said that the reliability of the C6 Elisa had been disproved.

Is it likely that someone who knows so little about Lyme that they have not even heard of Steere, would be in a position to have a complex debate about the sensitivity of the C6 Elisa?

She arrived at sci-med and immediately made friends with the known Steerites there such as "Charles05/chuck Adams", "Derdrittemann" and the phony "Iladsfan" who hates ILADS and has been trying to find out info to hurt Dr Lionetti.

These characters welcomed her and praised her looks, one of them even said that she was so beautiful that the "hypthyroid hippos" at LymeNet would be jealous. She accepted this praise and wrote this to her "new" friends about LymeNet:

"I just wanted to thank a few of you for being sane and seeing the
strangeness over there.
They are highly paranoid, delusional and only happy when they are
scaring new people into thinking they will be like Tiny Tim in two
weeks if they don't medicate up.

That discussion group should come with a set of rubber walls when you
join. "

You need to understand, Carol, that there are huge interests at stake here. There are insurance companies who are desperate to deny the existence of chronic Lyme as long-term treatment hits their enormous profits. There are big pharma companies like Glaxo SmithKline who lost millions when the vaccine they marketed was exposed (by Kathleen Dickson and others) as dangerous and ineffective. There are real estate and property barons who stand to lose mutli millions of dollars if it is acknowledged that their land is in a Lyme-endemic area/ and/or that Lyme is a serious and often chronicc disease. And there is also a military issue round Lyme and tick-borne disease.

With such huge and powerful interests at stake, it would not be surprising if they financed 100 full-timers to sit on the internet and create mayhem in the Lyme patient advocacy movement.

Here is Jopn, later proved in court to be the Steerite Dr John Nowakowski of NY Medical College, also claiming to be a Lyme patient and concerned parent:

JOPN Jun 30 1999, 3:00 am show options

Newsgroups: sci.med.diseases.lyme
From: [email protected] (JOPN) - Find messages by this author
Date: 1999/06/30
Subject: Hi
Reply to Author | Forward | Print | Individual Message | Show original | Report Abuse

I will not stop posting to this group. You call for for scientific discourse
yet you attack all others with differing views. I am not affiliated with Yale,
NIH, Stony Brook, NewYork Medical College, etc. - you cannot stop me from
posting what I believe is good advice to those who ask questions on this group.
I am a concerned parent who has had Lyme disease - and who's children have been
subjected to unproven medical therapy. I will not allow you to damage the lives
of others.I WILL NOT STOP
-------------------

JOPN Jul 2 1999, 3:00 am show options

Newsgroups: sci.med.diseases.lyme
From: [email protected] (JOPN) - Find messages by this author
Date: 1999/07/02
Subject: Re: Hi
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>EXCUSE ME~ (meant to shout), but do either of you to ignoramuses have
>lyme?

Yes you idiot I do
------------------------

I suggest you read several posts by this "MichelleP", and take special note of the attitude of the known Steerites towards her on sci-med, then ask yourself if she really sounds like a person who is desperately concerned about her child.

Michele has been a member of the other board (not sci.med) for a while, as have I.
I do not know her personally, but I am familiar with her "style."

When someone comes in and asks questions about Lyme Disease or a tick bite, I refer them to LymeNet. Although I provide information, I know that hearing it from many others will help the person to realize the gravity of the situation.

I am the only one who knew for sure that Michele came to LymeNet on my advice, unless there are other Lymies who read both boards.

Michele thought SHE had been insulted at LymeNet.
She also confused posts from DocDave with one from DoxyDave, which complicated things.
(DoxyDave stated that he was not a doctor. Michele thought it was DocDave saying that.)
This colored her responses.

If you read Michele's first posts to Kathleen, you can see that Michele does not realize who she is.
Although she is not familiar with Kathleen's background, she does not hesitate to give her advice.

I had already tried to tell Michele that she needed to read background information about Steere, Kathleen, and alot of other stuff, so that she could do a good job if she wanted to write an article. I don't think Michele wants to spend alot of time on this. She did not seem interested in finding out about all the crap that has been going on.

I did not see the post about the reliability of the C6 Elisa.
I would be interested in reading that.

I do realize that there are huge interests at stake here.
This is a big, big story. Someone who wants to write about it will need to spend a long time on it, and I don't think Michele is our gal.

If she does not sound "desperately concerned about her child," it may be that she does not realize how serious could be. Also, I don't think we can judge how "concerned" someone is.

If she returns to LymeNet, I hope she will be able to get the information she needs.
If you have differences with her, then "scroll on by."
She herself admits she is abrasive. I know that I couldn't go on sci.med and dish it back out to those guys. She's the type who can.

Wishing you the best,
Carol

Thank you for taking your time to give this background material.

Based on private email with michelep, and reading lymenet and sci.med I personally am convinced Michele is not at all concerned with her family's health but rather with gathering information unfavorable to the Lyme community.

The title of the post made a claim that Yale was in the wrong about the C6 test. The text did not back up that assertation.

I truly think you are making too much of this.
Her posts on the other health board (not sci.med) delineate her search for information, and her growing conviction that she and her doctors have the situation under control.

She had to choose whose information to believe, and she chose her doctors.
Can you blame her?

Then she went to sci.med and found people who agreed with her that the lymies at LymeNet were a little crazy.
Well, yes, there are a bunch of people here who do have mental health issues, often without realizing it.

For example, did you know that there is a mental problem (can't remember the name) where the patient writes pages and pages of information, going on and on, with little organization.
Apparently they cannot organize their thoughts and condense a composition down to the essentials.

As many of us lymies have problems with hypoperfusion of the brain (low blood flow) we are not exactly "sharp as a tack."
We need to make allowances for this when reading other's posts.

But....we misinterpret, take offense where none was intended, and attack when we feel threatened.
This happens all the time.