SLO Farmers Market Booth

Here are Marla and Emily at our first booth. Thanks for your hard work. If you want to help at the booth for any of the next three Thursdays, contact Emily at ekennedy2000@msn.com.

Research: Measuring antibiotic effectiveness on Bb, cysts and biofilm

Here's the link to new research results on culturing Bb and testing antibiotics' effectiveness for its various forms. This paragraph summarizes the results:

Results: Doxycycline reduced spirochetal structures ~90% but increased the number of round body forms about twofold. Amoxicillin reduced spirochetal forms by ~85%–90% and round body forms by ~68%, while treatment with metronidazole led to reduction of spirochetal structures by ~90% and round body forms by ~80%. Tigecycline and tinidazole treatment reduced both spirochetal and round body forms by ~80%–90%. When quantitative effects on biofilm-like colonies were evaluated, the five antibiotics reduced formation of these colonies by only 30%–55%. In terms of qualitative effects, only tinidazole reduced viable organisms by ~90%. Following treatment with the other antibiotics, viable organisms were detected in 70%–85% of the biofilm-like colonies.

Please read the full report for more details.

Lyme humor

Here's the link to this cartoon. We've got to laugh, right?

It's official. May is Lyme Disease Awareness Month in SLO County

Tuesday, May 3, the SLO County Board of Supervisors proclaimed May to be Lyme Disease Awareness Month. Seven members of SLO Lyme participated in the ceremony with the Board of Supervisors. Special thanks to Marla for making this happen and to Supervisor Patterson for sponsoring it.

To view the event, click here to go to the BOS website. Click on year 2011, then click on "Watch" in May 3 meeting link; once the video opens, click on item B-4 to see this segment.

Nobel prize winner supports homeopathic medicine

In dealing with Lyme, we're open to multiple paths to healing. This article explains homeopathy well and tells of the story of how criticized its early practitioners were. Kind of reminds me of how LLMDs are treated today.

Link to article: Homeopathy taken seriously

Dr. Luc Montagnier, the French virologist who won the Nobel Prize in 2008 for discovering the AIDS virus, has surprised the scientific community with his strong support for homeopathic medicine. 

In a remarkable interview published in Science magazine of December 24, 2010, Professor Luc Montagnier has expressed support for the often maligned and misunderstood medical specialty of homeopathic medicine. Although homeopathy has persisted for 200+ years throughout the world and has been the leading alternative treatment method used by physicians in Europe, most conventional physicians and scientists have expressed skepticism about its efficacy due to the extremely small doses of medicines used.

Tick Repellent Study

A new tick repellent is being tested now that sounds promising. Here's a link to the webpage about it:
Tick repellent study
The company, GenoPrint, is looking for volunteers to test the repellent during 2011. Initial testing showed it to be very effective. And what I like about it is it's supposed to be very nontoxic with no fragrances. I know none of us is tramping in the woods currently, but if you know some hikers, you might want to let them know about it. The initial testing showed it to be 100 percent effective! Wow, that sounds like it could really help us. Gee, if I get well again (oops, when I get well), I might be brave enough to go hiking again with help like this.