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Comment by jph | Hacker News Reader

This is terrifying. A friend's kid is fighting back to help people: she's just 13 and she's learning as fast as she can about medicine.

Website and donate link: http://livlymefoundation.org/

“She went from this sweet, bubbly kid with a twinkle in her eye, to a child who could not track you, who was completely checked out”.

They went to doctor after doctor but no one could provide an answer. Finally, 51 doctors and 18 months later, they found out Goodreau had Lyme disease.

https://www.thedenverchannel.com/lifestyle/health/denver-gir...

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There is a tiny minority of primary care physicians ("Lyme-Literate Medical Doctors") who will blame any fatigue of unknown etiology on Lyme disease and/or other tick-borne diseases, despite the lack of any clinical signs like the classic red ring or commonly accepted lab results like antibody assays. They prescribe powerful antibiotics on a long term basis, despite the severe side-effects and the complete lack of evidence that such treatments are helpful.

I blame this problem on the fact that some maladies just don't have any answers yet, but people want to provide them. For some, it's chronic lyme. For others, it's biofilms (Cf. the Marshall protocol), subluxations (chiropractic), or unbalanced qi (reiki).

> despite the lack of any clinical signs like the classic red ring

Afaik proper diagnosis still poses quite a bit of challenge. The red ring doesn't always happen, in a German trial only 23% of neuroborreliosis patients actually had the "wanderröte". [0] Similar problems with the antibody assays: They can only detect if the pathogen had been present/not present, but not if it's an acute or a chronic infection. That's why some physicians keep on giving long-term antibiotics regimes, based on the assumption that it's a chronic infection.

[0] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00115-003-1560-z#...

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, and you see it in duck territory, and there have been ducks traipsing around where you found it, it's probably a duck.

Speculating on the risks of treatment is premature when the cost is a few $k a year and the alternative is shitty quality of life.

Prove that long-term antibiotic treatment is harmful, and then prove that there exists a better treatment. Daraprim may be extremely toxic, and cost $750/pill, but people still take it.

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