How To Prevent Lyme Disease

Lyme disease has emerged as the most common vector borne infectious disease in the United States and has presented a growing challenge to public health officials over the past three decades. The infection represents a significant disease burden to the population of the United States with nearly 30,000 new cases diagnosed per year and an estimated additional 270,000 annual incident cases that go unreported. The disease results from a bacterial infection with the spirochete bacteria B. burgdorferi. This bacterial agent is transmitted to humans from the bite of a tick and is most commonly associated Ixodes species blacklegged ticks. These ticks represent the largest genus of the family Ixodidae and mainly inhabit temperate forest or grassland

My health promotion program will focus on Lyme disease. My state-Maryland is number one in the list of top ten states for Lyme disease in United States. According to Physicians Now (2016), "Although there were fewer cases of Lyme disease reported in 2012 than in previous years, the illness is still more common in Maryland than in many other states. There were 1,113 confirmed cases and 538 suspected cases in 2012, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention."

“Lyme disease got its name from where it was first discovered in Lyme, Connecticut in 1975” (healthychildren.org). “Since then there has been thousands of cases reported of the disease. The ticks live in low and high seasonal temperatures and high humidity” (healthychildren.org). Lyme Disease most common to occur in the Northeast, North-central states, or West Coast. On behalf of the Northeast, I can tell you that ticks are everywhere in this region. They like to live in tall grasses and woody areas. “The small insects more than often latch onto the foot or lower leg and crawl up the body, and travel up the body with a destination of the head. On their normal hosts, ticks also usually crawl up; they want to blood feed around the

Lyme disease was discovered in the 1970’s, as any other disease was, by a large number of cases, with patients having the same symptoms. In Lyme, Connecticut, a doctor was having patients who were all suffering from the same symptoms that made patients become debilitated. There were so many cases that the doctor marked it as an unknown disease. It wasn’t until later in the 1980’s that there were more widespread cases throughout the north-east. Lyme disease is becoming a serious problem in the north-east and especially in New York State, given the drastic increase of cases. Without treatment Lyme disease can result in blindness and in severe cases, death.

According to Dr. Dietrich Klinghardt (a world renowned Lyme expert), Lyme disease is considered the plague of the century due to the large number of people with chronic Lyme disease and the associated co-infections. The number one symptom of Lyme is chronic fatigue. People can have Lyme for a very long time and not be properly diagnosed because current laboratory testing comes up short with being able to detect it. One of the main reasons for this is because chronic Lyme does not live in the blood but rather in the tissues. It is an intracellular organism meaning it lives inside the cell. Lyme has different shapes: spirochete (like a spring), cyst with a hard shell, and acellular (without an outer cell membrane). Lyme likes to set up a sanctuary in the body such as in the brain, teeth (such as under a root canal or in a cavitation), vertebrae, breast tissue, and lymph nodes. It looks for a place where it can be protected and the body is vulnerable preferably in fatty tissue or under a biofilm. While traditionally Lyme disease is considered a tick-borne disease, recent findings have discovered that it is an insect-borne disease that can get transferred

Thesis Statement: “According to the Center of Disease Control, Lyme disease is the most commonly reported vector borne illness in the United States”(Lyme Disease: Data and statistics, 2016).

A survey was composed to try to understand whether living around wooded areas could increase susceptibility towards getting Lyme Disease, whether owning outdoor pets was a risk towards getting Lyme Disease, and finally, what type of deer tick preventative measures work best amongst animals. Surveys were collected in two ways: online surveys and telephone surveys. In the end, the results were checked through statistical analysis and proven significant. All the results were posted on the Facebook page.

In the US, the illness is the most prevalent of all tick-borne infections. The disease has been termed in New York, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Maryland an endemic infection. As of 2009, provides the most useful data regarding the infection, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recorded an approximation of confirmed Lyme disease cases ranging up to 30,000 new cases. The basic complication of Lyme disease possesses

Lyme disease is the most common vector-borne disease in the United States. The disease was first discovered in 1975 after a group of children were suffering from rheumatoid arthritis like disease. One similarity the children had was playing in wooded areas during the summer in the area of Lyme, Connecticut. However, the bacteria was not isolated until late 1981 by Dr. Willy Burgdorfer. Lyme disease has become an important public health problem in the Midwest and Eastern United States with incidence rates steadily increasing.

“Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacterium that causes Lyme disease, was first isolated in 1982 by Willy Burgdorfer, Ph.D., a zoologist and microbiologist at NIAID’s Rocky Mountain Laboratories (RML) in Hamilton, Montana.” (NIAID, 2008.) Dr. Burgdorfer at the time was studying Rocky Mountain Fever in attempt to help Jorge Benach, Ph.D., discover why more than 100 spotted fever cases occurred in New York between 1971 and 1976. “Dr. Benach, of the New York State Department of Health had been a source of American dog ticks for Burgdorfer to study.” (NIAID, 2008.)

One of the more common pests located in the Northeastern United States is the Black Legged Tick (Ixodes scapularis). More commonly known as the “Deer Tick” this animal primarily inhabits wooded areas populated by warm-blooded wildlife. Specifically the temperate Pine Barrens in Southern New Jersey, which hosts the 2nd largest tick population in the country (CDC, 2010), the black legged tick is a common pest that spreads lyme disease. This disease is a bacterial infection caused by the tick latching onto a host and feeding for an extended period of time. These ticks attach to most warm blooded woodland creatures and any human beings unfortunate enough to get close enough.

Lyme disease is a bacterial infection that is typically spread by ticks or most commonly known as deer ticks. It's estimated that over 300,000 people are diagnosed with lyme disease every year. Lyme disease is easily misdiagnosed  because its symptoms are closely related to other conditions. This disease could affect any part of the body , like the brain , nervous system , muscle and joints and the heart. Lyme disease can commonly mistaken for a number of other diseases such as chronic fatigue syndrome , fibromyalgia , multiple sclerosis , and various other ones.  Signs of early lyme disease feel like the flu and have the same symptoms.

Statistics obtained from the Center of Disease Control and Prevention show that there are approximately 300,000 cases of Lyme Disease reported in the United States annually (CDC, 2016). The above data categorizes Lyme Disease as the number one animal carried and vector-borne disease. Vector is a term used to describe a living organism able to carry and spread an infectious disease from either animal to human or human to human (WHO, 2016). Surprisingly, it was not until 1982 that the CDC placed Lyme as an official disease category. Even though the awareness of the Lyme disease increased throughout the years, many people are still unaware of the symptoms, transmission methods as well as the underlying cause of the disease

Lyme disease is vector borne disease that is caused by the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria. It is transmitted to humans by the nymphal stage of scapularis ticks (Levi et al, 2012). It is widespread in North America, and is often times discussed about in relation to deer population. While ticks use deer often as a reproductive host, this article discusses that deer are not the only factor that affect the prevalence of Lyme disease. Small mammals and predation play a major role in the emergence of this Lyme disease.

When trying to learn about a disease it is important to learn about who is effected by the disease. The Lyme Disease Association (2010) claims that 300,000 new cases of Lyme disease will occur in the United States each year. That is a very large number of Americans to contract one disease. Lyme disease is only found in certain areas of the country. The CDC (2015) states that “In 2014, 96% of confirmed Lyme disease cases were reported from 14 states” (Data and Statistics section, para. Fast Facts). Those states are Maryland,