WEBVTT - Selects: The Skinny on Lyme Disease 0:00:00.840 --> 0:00:04.880 Hey guys, it's Josh Josh Clark. No, not that Josh 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:07.080 Clark you went to high school with. Sorry to get 0:00:07.080 --> 0:00:09.600 your hopes up like that. This is Josh Clark from 0:00:09.640 --> 0:00:12.520 that podcast you listen to Stuff You Should Know, And 0:00:12.560 --> 0:00:16.520 for this week's SYSK Select, I'd chosen our September twenty 0:00:16.640 --> 0:00:20.600 nineteen episode on lime disease. This one's pretty fascinating because 0:00:20.600 --> 0:00:23.320 it turns out lime disease has a ton of intrigue 0:00:23.320 --> 0:00:26.319 associated with it. It started out with a cluster of 0:00:26.360 --> 0:00:29.640 weird symptoms of people in Connecticut, and then they finally 0:00:29.720 --> 0:00:32.400 figured out it was coming from tics. But the mystery 0:00:32.440 --> 0:00:36.040 wasn't over because people started developing chronic lime and at 0:00:36.040 --> 0:00:39.960 first the medical community didn't believe they had any disease whatsoever. 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:42.360 They thought it was all in their heads. Well they 0:00:42.360 --> 0:00:44.960 were wrong. You can find out about all this and 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:48.000 more in this episode on lime disease. 0:00:48.520 --> 0:01:03.680 Enjoy Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:01:04.240 --> 0:01:06.800 Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:10.120 Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry over there. This 0:01:10.240 --> 0:01:16.200 is Stuff you Should Know the podcast. Yeah, Chuck, I 0:01:16.200 --> 0:01:19.560 have a question for you. Yes, you know it kicks 0:01:19.600 --> 0:01:22.280 me OFFLME disease. 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:25.880 I'm so mad at you. 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:28.679 Blame you me for that one. She's like, you should 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:31.240 say this, and I said, you know what, I'm I 0:01:31.280 --> 0:01:32.640 should totally say that. 0:01:33.880 --> 0:01:35.640 Yeah. This is sort of a follow up to our 0:01:35.720 --> 0:01:40.840 July twenty seventh, twenty ten episode Why Ticks Suck In, 0:01:40.920 --> 0:01:43.320 which which is sort of a legendary episode because we 0:01:44.680 --> 0:01:48.080 falsely promised to send people T shirts if they made 0:01:48.120 --> 0:01:50.520 it all the way through the episode. That's right, We're 0:01:50.600 --> 0:01:52.840 just kidding. But we still get those requests of wears 0:01:52.840 --> 0:01:53.320 my shirt. 0:01:53.560 --> 0:01:56.920 Yes, that's hilarious. I forgot about that and also get 0:01:57.040 --> 0:01:57.720 sued today. 0:01:58.840 --> 0:02:02.559 Yeah. Probably. So. Also want to point out and shout 0:02:02.600 --> 0:02:07.040 out our former website HowStuffWorks dot com because a couple 0:02:07.080 --> 0:02:09.760 of the articles that we use for much of this 0:02:09.960 --> 0:02:12.480 episode is from the old HSW website. 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:15.040 Nice, they're holding it down over there. 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:17.000 They're holding it down and this is real good stuff. 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:21.000 Yeah. So we're talking today about lime disease. 0:02:20.760 --> 0:02:22.359 In particular, not limes. 0:02:23.280 --> 0:02:27.680 No, we should say it's capital l ym disease. And 0:02:27.720 --> 0:02:30.000 the reason it's called that is because it's named after 0:02:30.040 --> 0:02:32.600 a town which is one of three towns where the 0:02:32.639 --> 0:02:37.359 initial outbreak of lime disease that led to this bacterial 0:02:37.400 --> 0:02:43.400 infection persistent bacterial infection was first describe medically. 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:46.600 One of the facts of the show. I think, oh yeah, sure, 0:02:46.639 --> 0:02:49.480 who knew it was named after a town, Lime, Connecticut? 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:51.520 I knew did you know that before this? 0:02:51.800 --> 0:02:52.120 Sure? 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:53.640 Did we cover that? And why tik suck? 0:02:53.960 --> 0:02:54.600 I don't think so. 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:56.560 All right, well, you're smarter than me that. 0:02:56.800 --> 0:02:59.440 No, it's not that. I think what got me was 0:02:59.680 --> 0:03:02.680 I I heard about people saying, like, no lime disease, 0:03:02.760 --> 0:03:04.640 like people take it for granted, but it's actually some 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:07.000 this really mysterious illness. And I'm like, what are you 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.280 talking about? So I think I looked into this year's 0:03:09.280 --> 0:03:10.639 back and that's what I found out. 0:03:11.120 --> 0:03:13.720 All right, that was all So we're equally smart. 0:03:13.600 --> 0:03:15.239 Right exactly, I'm not smarter than you. 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:19.040 What is smart? It's just like someone happens to know 0:03:19.080 --> 0:03:21.960 one thing, someone else knows another. Sure, I say, they 0:03:22.000 --> 0:03:24.360 cancel out, we're all smart here you goo. 0:03:24.600 --> 0:03:26.239 I'm glad you pulled that out because I would have 0:03:26.240 --> 0:03:30.200 been like, what is smart? I couldn't have come up 0:03:30.240 --> 0:03:30.960 with the definition. 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:35.040 So lime disease, We'll go ahead and hit you with 0:03:35.040 --> 0:03:38.360 a couple of stats here. Lime disease in the United 0:03:38.400 --> 0:03:40.760 States is more than doubled since nineteen ninety seven. 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:42.800 That's astounding, it is. 0:03:43.680 --> 0:03:45.680 And it has spread too. It used to be very 0:03:45.840 --> 0:03:49.200 much localized in kind of the Northeast, sort of mid 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:53.720 Atlantic areas, some in the South, but now you can 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:57.240 get lime disease. And I believe the entire lower forty 0:03:57.240 --> 0:03:58.400 eight is that correct. 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:02.200 There are cases in all forty eight states. Supposedly half 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:05.160 of the counties in the United States now are considered 0:04:05.200 --> 0:04:08.720 a high risk for lime disease. And like all of 0:04:08.760 --> 0:04:13.600 this happened just in the last like twenty or so years. Yeah, 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:16.320 which is I mean, there's a lot of debate over 0:04:16.480 --> 0:04:20.880 the CDC calls lime disease endemic, which is a disease 0:04:21.040 --> 0:04:25.400 that has become a like an ongoing part of an 0:04:25.480 --> 0:04:28.719 area or region, and some other people are saying, guys, 0:04:29.120 --> 0:04:31.240 what we're talking about here is an epidemic. This is 0:04:31.240 --> 0:04:33.520 an epidemic, and you should start calling it that because 0:04:33.520 --> 0:04:36.159 it will kind of raise the alarm to the next 0:04:36.480 --> 0:04:39.440 level or two where it should be. Because this is 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:43.479 a very alarming spread of disease that we're seeing right now, 0:04:44.000 --> 0:04:49.080 lime disease is the number one vector borne disease in 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:52.240 the United States. It's way more prevalent than things like 0:04:52.440 --> 0:04:55.159 West Nile or chicken gooony or anything like that, but 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:57.400 it's still kind of treated as like up there in 0:04:57.440 --> 0:05:00.000 the northeastern US thing, and that's just not the case. 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:04.360 It's spread in every direction except east because it hit 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:07.719 the Atlantic, but everywhere else where. It can spread into 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:10.360 the interior of the United States and up into Canada. 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:11.400 It's starting to. 0:05:11.760 --> 0:05:14.960 Yeah, and there's also a history continuing to this day 0:05:15.040 --> 0:05:22.440 even where lime disease can be overlooked, misdiagnosed, not taken 0:05:22.560 --> 0:05:26.960 as seriously by your doctor as it should be, including 0:05:27.080 --> 0:05:29.640 what we'll get to later on something called post treatment 0:05:29.760 --> 0:05:34.039 lime disease syndrome. And it's all very frustrating if you 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:38.719 have been an individual that has had lime disease. There's 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:40.400 a big community out there of people that are like, 0:05:40.400 --> 0:05:43.160 why won't anyone listen to us, Why won't our doctors 0:05:43.160 --> 0:05:46.000 take as seriously? And what do we have to do here? 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:47.920 Like do we have to start dropping dead? 0:05:48.680 --> 0:05:52.120 Yeah, there's a tremendous amount of frustration in that community 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:56.480 because there's a sentiment among the medical establishment that. 0:05:56.800 --> 0:05:58.440 You know, he takes some antiotics. 0:05:58.720 --> 0:06:01.560 Exactly, it's easy to cure lime disease. Here's some antibiotics. 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:05.000 You still have persistent symptoms. Those are probably in your head. 0:06:05.080 --> 0:06:06.440 We're not going to say they're in your head, but 0:06:06.839 --> 0:06:09.200 they're in your head. And the people who are experiencing 0:06:09.200 --> 0:06:12.560 these symptoms are like, no, my life has been derailed 0:06:12.600 --> 0:06:15.200 by these symptoms, and you guys aren't doing anything about it. 0:06:16.120 --> 0:06:18.400 It's frustrating. I know there's a lot of people out 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:20.560 there that are pretty pretty stoked right now to be 0:06:20.560 --> 0:06:24.000 hearing this. Yeah, you know for sure we're advocating for 0:06:24.040 --> 0:06:26.760 you guys. Sure, not patting myself on the back, although 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:28.080 I am literally patty like. 0:06:28.000 --> 0:06:31.520 I see you chuck here. That albow is sticking out 0:06:31.560 --> 0:06:32.960 pretty far. So. 0:06:33.360 --> 0:06:37.160 Lime disease is a disease. It's an infection caused by 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:44.320 the bacterium boro lea burgdorfrairi wow borg da faery burg 0:06:44.360 --> 0:06:44.839 dea fraiari. 0:06:45.240 --> 0:06:47.320 We're gonna get you an apron and call you the 0:06:47.360 --> 0:06:48.440 word butcher. 0:06:48.440 --> 0:06:52.520 Burgdor fairy work more. And we'll get to why it's 0:06:52.520 --> 0:06:54.719 called that in a bit. But if you haven't caught 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:57.200 on by now, it is transmitted through tick bites. 0:06:57.880 --> 0:07:01.840 Right, So, a tick, and in particular a nymph stage 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:05.359 of a tick, which is a young adult or juvenile tick, 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:12.760 will transmit this bacteria, the Borellia burgdor fairy, into a human. 0:07:12.920 --> 0:07:15.200 And the reason we usually get it from nymphs chuck 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:20.240 is because an adult tick doesn't find humans particularly appetizing, 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:23.480 but a nymph tick will because they're stupid, they don't 0:07:23.520 --> 0:07:27.040 know anything yet. So as they're feeding on us. After 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:30.200 somewhere maybe around twenty four to thirty six hours of 0:07:30.240 --> 0:07:33.840 feeding this infected tick that has this bacteria in it, 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:36.320 the bacteria will make its way from the mid gut 0:07:36.600 --> 0:07:40.040 to the tick saliva and the tick transmit it transmits 0:07:40.040 --> 0:07:43.480 it into the human bloodstream, where it just absolutely wreaks 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:45.480 havoc on the human body. 0:07:45.880 --> 0:07:48.520 Yeah, and you said something really key there, twenty four 0:07:48.720 --> 0:07:52.360 thirty six, forty eight hours later, really really important. They 0:07:52.360 --> 0:07:54.400 have to be attached to you for that long, sometimes 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:58.640 even longer to transmit this bacterium. So if you find 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:00.080 a tick on you and you get it off, if 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:03.200 you don't need to sweat lime disease, no, if you 0:08:03.240 --> 0:08:04.480 get it off in due time. 0:08:04.520 --> 0:08:06.760 Right exactly, If like you see it's still crawling on you. 0:08:06.880 --> 0:08:10.120 It's unattached, you don't worry about it at all. But 0:08:10.240 --> 0:08:13.280 when it is attached and when it has transmitted the 0:08:13.320 --> 0:08:18.800 bacteria what it's transmitted, This be burgdor Ferry is like 0:08:19.040 --> 0:08:22.720 really amazing at its job, which is infecting you, giving 0:08:22.720 --> 0:08:26.920 you a bacterial infection. It has figured out how to 0:08:27.200 --> 0:08:29.960 zoom through the bloodstream but then also take itself out 0:08:29.960 --> 0:08:33.680 of the bloodstream by latching onto the walls of your 0:08:33.760 --> 0:08:34.560 blood vessels. 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:38.000 Yeah, this was crazy about this cellular stuff that once 0:08:38.040 --> 0:08:41.160 it's attached to a cell. They said, it's like a slinky. 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:45.320 It doesn't let go. It just like basically reaches out 0:08:45.360 --> 0:08:47.520 and grabs the next cell without letting go of the 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:51.280 previous cell and just sort of walks end over end right, 0:08:51.360 --> 0:08:52.840 never unattaching. 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:56.640 Itself right exactly. So as it's moving along, it's never 0:08:57.360 --> 0:08:59.640 it's not going to get kind of you know, washed 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:02.600 away and the extracellular matrix it's stuck to the cell. 0:09:02.640 --> 0:09:04.120 If it wants to be stuck in the cell, it 0:09:04.160 --> 0:09:06.160 can do the same thing to the blood vessel walls 0:09:06.200 --> 0:09:08.400 to pull itself out of the bloodstream and then go 0:09:08.520 --> 0:09:12.160 attack you know, specific parts of the body, So it's 0:09:12.360 --> 0:09:15.360 really good at hanging on. That's one thing that makes 0:09:15.400 --> 0:09:19.319 it kind of pernicious. And then another thing exactly, it's 0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:21.600 basically yeah, it's like the bacteria version of a tick. 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:25.280 I didn't think about that. And then another thing it does, Chuck, 0:09:25.760 --> 0:09:28.959 I think this is really really recent research. It can 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:33.640 actually change its protein expression at a much faster rate 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:37.640 than the normal mutation rate for bacteria, something like fifteen 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:38.400 times faster. 0:09:38.640 --> 0:09:40.800 Yeah, And what that does is that just makes it 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:44.280 really hard for our human immune system to catch up to. 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:47.560 It, right, because our immune system will produce antibodies based 0:09:47.600 --> 0:09:50.480 on the initial infection, but by the time the antibodies 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:57.120 come around, the bacteria may have changed itself so that 0:09:57.360 --> 0:09:59.959 the antibodies won't recognize it. They'll just go right past 0:10:00.120 --> 0:10:02.520 it because it doesn't it doesn't fit the description that 0:10:02.559 --> 0:10:03.640 the antibodies have. 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:07.079 That's right, And you'll know that something bad is happening 0:10:07.960 --> 0:10:10.360 first of all if you find that tick. But if 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:15.240 you get headaches, fever, fatigue is a huge, huge symptom. 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:19.360 But the real telltale is what's called em It's an 0:10:19.360 --> 0:10:25.680 expanding skin rash called erythema migrants and it's like it's 0:10:25.760 --> 0:10:28.640 that circular pattern. And then we did talk about this 0:10:28.720 --> 0:10:31.400 on the Ticks episode. But it's a circular pattern with 0:10:31.679 --> 0:10:33.480 what looks like a bull's eye in the center of it. 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:36.200 Yes, and you can take off your butcher's apron now 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:39.720 because you just that was beautiful, put on your chef's 0:10:39.920 --> 0:10:40.480 chef's hat. 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:41.520 You're sweating over there. 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:47.680 So that that particular rash, that bullseye rash, that is 0:10:47.720 --> 0:10:50.160 like a just an absolute telltale sign that you have 0:10:50.679 --> 0:11:00.360 a line boreolis boreliosis infection that only comes around and 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:03.440 like maybe seventy to eighty percent of cases. I think 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:07.480 if every person got that rash, we would not have 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:10.040 this problem with lime disease because it would be caught 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:12.440 very quickly because you get that within usually about a 0:11:12.480 --> 0:11:16.400 week or less of getting infected. But it doesn't come 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:20.319 up in all cases. And with some of those other 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:26.359 symptoms like you said, like weakness, headaches, flu like symptoms 0:11:26.400 --> 0:11:28.959 like those could be a lot of different other things, 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:36.280 joint pain, and so the lime disease infection goes undiagnosed 0:11:36.360 --> 0:11:38.880 or misdiagnosed in a lot of cases, are did for 0:11:39.000 --> 0:11:41.400 many many years. It's just now that they're starting to 0:11:41.480 --> 0:11:44.800 kind of recognize it or suspect lime when otherwise they 0:11:44.880 --> 0:11:45.559 might not have. 0:11:46.000 --> 0:11:49.520 Yeah. I mean literally hundreds of things can be can 0:11:49.559 --> 0:11:53.440 have the same symptoms as lime disease. So lime's been 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:56.320 around for a long time. We'll talk about the history 0:11:56.360 --> 0:11:58.280 here in a minute, as far as the nineteen seventies 0:11:58.280 --> 0:12:02.920 go and official recognition, but it's been around. I believe 0:12:02.960 --> 0:12:06.719 the Yale School of Public Health find the bacterium in 0:12:06.880 --> 0:12:12.840 ancient North America, like sixty thousand years old before the 0:12:12.920 --> 0:12:16.760 arrival of humans. They have an autopsy of a fifty 0:12:16.840 --> 0:12:20.480 three hundred year old mummy that had lime disease. 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:24.200 Yeah, you know Utzi the Iceman, remember him? 0:12:24.360 --> 0:12:25.120 I remember Uzzy? 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:27.640 Yeah. I was disappointed that they referred to him as 0:12:27.640 --> 0:12:29.520 a fifty three hundred year old mummy. It's like, no, 0:12:29.559 --> 0:12:32.080 it's Utzi the ice everybody knows him, give him his name. 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:33.560 But he had lime disease. 0:12:33.800 --> 0:12:36.080 He did. And there was a German physician named Alfred 0:12:36.160 --> 0:12:41.840 Buckwald who described this that em skin rash that we 0:12:41.960 --> 0:12:44.560 now call lime disease about one hundred and thirty years ago. 0:12:45.320 --> 0:12:49.640 Right, So lime disease has been around a while, but 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:54.320 we are just now seeing a huge again an epidemic 0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:57.800 of it, and in a massive spread of it, not 0:12:57.880 --> 0:13:00.760 just in North America, but there's also two other kinds 0:13:00.800 --> 0:13:04.600 of ticks that transmit two other kinds of lime causing 0:13:04.640 --> 0:13:08.880 bacteria in Europe and Asia, and in all three places, 0:13:08.880 --> 0:13:12.680 North America, Europe, and parts of Asia, the incidence of 0:13:12.760 --> 0:13:15.800 lime diseases picking up at an alarming pace. 0:13:16.559 --> 0:13:19.440 I think we should slow down our pace. Take break. Okay, 0:13:19.520 --> 0:13:21.600 all right, we'll come back and we'll talk about Lime 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:54.080 Connecticut right after this. All right, So Lime, Connecticut. Something 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:57.880 is very old hat to you. 0:13:56.600 --> 0:13:59.920 Right it for years Lime Old Lime? 0:14:00.000 --> 0:14:02.760 And what was the third town? I don't remember, No, 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:06.439 let's just call it New Lime. It was. 0:14:06.520 --> 0:14:08.480 Notice, they're going to be so mad. Their high school 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:11.360 football team is going to go brazik on Old Lime 0:14:11.440 --> 0:14:11.880 this year. 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:13.880 In the nineteen seventies, though, there were a group of 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:17.800 children and adults in these towns in Connecticut that were 0:14:17.840 --> 0:14:22.040 having all these weird symptoms swollen knees, skin rashes, headaches, 0:14:22.560 --> 0:14:27.640 all this severe fatigue. And it's bad enough these days, 0:14:27.640 --> 0:14:31.480 But in the early nineteen seventies, doctors were definitely did 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:34.680 not have this on the radar and were very dismissive 0:14:34.720 --> 0:14:36.960 of what was going on in these towns and if 0:14:36.960 --> 0:14:39.760 it were not for the work of Judith Minch and 0:14:39.840 --> 0:14:44.920 Polly Murray too, just regular moms. Although Polly Murray did 0:14:44.920 --> 0:14:47.840 work for the World Health Organization for a while. They 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:50.840 were advocates. They were patient advocates because their families were 0:14:50.840 --> 0:14:54.560 getting sick and no one would listen. And they were like, 0:14:54.680 --> 0:14:58.320 someone's got to do something. Something's going on here, and 0:14:58.440 --> 0:15:01.360 these doctors are not being any help, right, And it 0:15:01.440 --> 0:15:03.400 was a big deal. Polly Murray ended up writing a book. 0:15:03.440 --> 0:15:05.880 She made it sort of her life's work in nineteen 0:15:05.920 --> 0:15:09.360 ninety six, a book called The Widening Circle. And because 0:15:09.360 --> 0:15:13.880 of sort of the persistent sexism and science, they were 0:15:14.000 --> 0:15:16.680 largely discounted, even though they had a list of thirty 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:22.720 seven individuals they researched on their own, contacted scientists. We 0:15:22.880 --> 0:15:24.960 just really need to shout them out. Polly Murray died 0:15:25.720 --> 0:15:28.200 just about a month ago at the age of eighty five. 0:15:28.360 --> 0:15:30.840 Oh is that right? Yeah, Yeah, she was a persistent 0:15:30.920 --> 0:15:33.200 cuss as they call them up in the Yankee States. 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:33.720 That's right. 0:15:34.080 --> 0:15:39.280 So on the one hand, yes, from the everything I've 0:15:39.280 --> 0:15:41.760 read and all the impressions I have. They were very 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:45.040 much dismissed, and it was very much sexist and also 0:15:45.280 --> 0:15:48.760 I think because they weren't doctors. But on the other hand, 0:15:48.760 --> 0:15:51.320 the doctors who were being presented with these cases were like, 0:15:51.520 --> 0:15:53.600 I have no idea what this is, so let's just 0:15:53.640 --> 0:15:56.960 pretend it's not real. But luckily those two women in 0:15:57.040 --> 0:16:00.440 the groups that they established, they went on and they 0:16:00.480 --> 0:16:04.880 contacted Yale Medical School, they contacted the state, and they 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:06.680 really kind of put this on the map. They said, 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:10.000 there is a mysterious epidemic that's going on where you 0:16:10.040 --> 0:16:12.800 have a lot of kids who suddenly have juvenile arthritis 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:14.640 out of nowhere. What are you guys going to do 0:16:14.680 --> 0:16:19.240 about it? And because of their agitation, this mystery made 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:22.680 its way to the desk or I guess, the microscope 0:16:23.080 --> 0:16:27.600 of a guy named Willie Bergdorffer, and he was at 0:16:27.600 --> 0:16:31.880 the time the world's foremost authority on what's called Rocky 0:16:31.920 --> 0:16:36.040 Mountain spotted fever, which is another tickborn bacterial infection. 0:16:36.400 --> 0:16:37.960 I remember that when I was a kid, that was 0:16:38.120 --> 0:16:40.880 a big news item. It was a scary one. 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:44.040 He was working out in Colorado, and Colorado was ground 0:16:44.160 --> 0:16:47.880 zero for Rocky Mountain spotted fever. For a while, which is, yeah, 0:16:47.920 --> 0:16:49.560 you do not want to have that. It's a really 0:16:49.600 --> 0:16:53.640 bad bacterial infection. But by this time they had done 0:16:53.760 --> 0:16:57.520 thanks to the legwork done by the moms and the 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:01.240 patient advocate groups in the Lime, Connecticut, it had been 0:17:01.400 --> 0:17:04.760 pretty well established that the common thread between all these people, 0:17:05.040 --> 0:17:07.960 besides where they lived and by the way, it was 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:13.400 chuck lyme Old Lime and East HadAM sorry East HadAM 0:17:13.840 --> 0:17:15.399 aside from the fact that they all lived in the 0:17:15.400 --> 0:17:18.080 same region, was that all of them were almost all 0:17:18.119 --> 0:17:20.720 of them were called being bitten by a tick, and 0:17:20.800 --> 0:17:23.080 a lot of them had a mysterious rash right before 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:26.720 the symptoms presented. So it came to this guy, Willie 0:17:27.320 --> 0:17:32.119 Bergdorffer's microscope because they had said, there's something in the 0:17:32.119 --> 0:17:34.679 ticks here that is creating this disease that we haven't 0:17:34.800 --> 0:17:36.000 encountered before. 0:17:36.440 --> 0:17:43.080 That's right, and he had already discovered this bacterium called 0:17:43.080 --> 0:17:45.080 it How do you how do you pronounce that spirit. 0:17:44.840 --> 0:17:49.119 Chat spira keet, spire key, But spira keet is a 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:55.320 type of bacteria, and that's what that's what they all, right, 0:17:56.480 --> 0:17:58.520 spirra chet and you just made me think of the 0:17:58.560 --> 0:18:01.399 older brother Chet and weird. 0:18:01.200 --> 0:18:02.920 Now go make yourself one. But what. 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:06.600 Man? That guy had some good quotes. 0:18:06.640 --> 0:18:12.280 Oh yeah, rip what what Bill Paxton when he died 0:18:12.359 --> 0:18:13.960 a couple of years ago? Very sad? 0:18:14.760 --> 0:18:17.200 Are you sure I'm thinking of Bill Pullman? 0:18:18.320 --> 0:18:20.800 No, Bill Paxton died. It was so sad because I 0:18:20.840 --> 0:18:23.480 had just listened to his uh Mark Maron interview and 0:18:23.520 --> 0:18:26.679 he was like, after that episode, I wanted nothing more 0:18:26.760 --> 0:18:29.439 than to be Bill Paxton's friend and neighbor. He just 0:18:29.440 --> 0:18:31.840 sounded like the best guy and best family man. And 0:18:32.119 --> 0:18:33.359 he passed away way too early. 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:36.119 Yeah, really, I did not know about that. 0:18:36.200 --> 0:18:36.400 Yeah. 0:18:36.400 --> 0:18:39.320 I saw Frailty not too many weeks ago. It's still 0:18:39.400 --> 0:18:39.920 pretty good. 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:41.480 Was it the first viewinger? 0:18:42.000 --> 0:18:43.480 No? No, no, I've seen it before. 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:44.960 But yeah, man, great movie. 0:18:45.320 --> 0:18:48.159 Yeah. But he wrote and I believe directed and starred 0:18:48.160 --> 0:18:48.359 in it. 0:18:48.480 --> 0:18:50.280 Yeah. It was so good. And I love a good 0:18:50.320 --> 0:18:51.880 Powers Booth cast and call. 0:18:52.119 --> 0:18:55.680 For sure it was. It was unusual and surprising. 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:59.719 But it was perfect, very good, underrated film. Where are we? Oh? 0:18:59.800 --> 0:19:03.240 Yeah, we were talking about Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Willie 0:19:03.240 --> 0:19:07.919 Bergdorfer identifying the spiro keet that was causing. 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:12.240 Lime hirakeet right, spira chet What a dumb, dumb. 0:19:13.040 --> 0:19:16.200 Yeah. No, remember we established we're all smart. 0:19:16.280 --> 0:19:22.480 He Yeah, So he discovered this, this parakeet, and he 0:19:22.600 --> 0:19:28.320 was honored by this discovery and naming that thing after himself. 0:19:28.320 --> 0:19:29.880 That's why it has that interesting name. 0:19:30.200 --> 0:19:32.320 I get the impression. And he didn't name it after himself. 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:35.480 They named it after him to go on. 0:19:35.840 --> 0:19:37.480 Yeah, okay, but. 0:19:37.480 --> 0:19:39.960 There's a big difference between him saying this thing's called 0:19:40.359 --> 0:19:44.280 the Burgdorferey bacteria and somebody saying we're going to name 0:19:44.320 --> 0:19:45.040 this after you. 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:46.160 No, I totally agree. 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:52.560 Okay, So Burgdorfrey or Burgdorfer. He figures out what is 0:19:52.600 --> 0:19:55.120 the basis of lime disease, which is great. That's an 0:19:55.280 --> 0:19:58.920 enormous breakthrough. It establishes that yes, it is its own thing, 0:19:58.960 --> 0:20:02.359 it's its own disease. And because it was a bacteria, 0:20:02.800 --> 0:20:04.720 it's a spier key, which again it's a kind of 0:20:04.800 --> 0:20:09.640 a snakelike shaped bacteria specific kind that walks like a slinky. 0:20:11.119 --> 0:20:14.520 Because it was a bacterial infection, the medical establishment said, oh, 0:20:14.600 --> 0:20:19.159 we got this here. Take some antibiotics, and over the 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:22.840 course of several years, starting in I think the nineties, 0:20:22.880 --> 0:20:25.200 is when they really started to say, okay, we can 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:28.960 cure lyme disease, especially if we catch it early on 0:20:30.040 --> 0:20:33.320 by a two to four week round of antibiotics. Right, 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:36.480 here you go, and they said, case closed, we're the 0:20:36.480 --> 0:20:39.639 medical establishment. Let's go have a party for ourselves. 0:20:39.920 --> 0:20:43.400 Yeah, And here's the thing, Like many times that can 0:20:43.520 --> 0:20:46.199 take care of the problem. So it's not like they 0:20:46.200 --> 0:20:49.720 were just lazy and not doing their work. But I 0:20:49.720 --> 0:20:51.439 think they closed the book a little too soon, and 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:54.800 a lot of people do because that oral that round 0:20:54.800 --> 0:20:58.400 of oral antibiotics, if you catch it early, it can 0:20:58.480 --> 0:21:01.000 really work. But and I think they say, what like 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:02.879 nine times out of ten, if you catch it early, 0:21:03.640 --> 0:21:07.040 then that will that will work right there. 0:21:07.160 --> 0:21:11.480 So they're so persistent with that assertion that if you 0:21:11.560 --> 0:21:14.760 find a tick on yourself and you live in an 0:21:14.840 --> 0:21:18.760 area where lime disease is known to thrive, if you 0:21:18.800 --> 0:21:20.840 can't say how long that tick's been on you, they're 0:21:20.880 --> 0:21:25.120 probably just going to give you a round of antibiotics portolactically. Yeah. 0:21:26.080 --> 0:21:28.520 And again, like you said, in a lot of cases, 0:21:28.560 --> 0:21:31.800 and I believe, from what I've read, the vast majority 0:21:31.800 --> 0:21:35.520 of cases in early stage lime disease, that round of 0:21:35.520 --> 0:21:37.040 antibiotics should work. 0:21:38.080 --> 0:21:40.040 Yeah, And they say that if you and This is 0:21:40.080 --> 0:21:44.120 from the American Lime Diesus Foundation quote. If you live 0:21:44.359 --> 0:21:49.760 in an endemic area, have symptoms consistent with early lime disease, 0:21:49.800 --> 0:21:52.720 and suspect recent exposure to a tick, present your suspicion 0:21:52.760 --> 0:21:54.879 to your doctor so that he or she may make 0:21:54.920 --> 0:21:56.400 a more informed diagnosis. 0:21:56.440 --> 0:21:59.679 So show up to your doctor and say, yeah, madam, 0:22:00.280 --> 0:22:02.800