Lyme Disease Vaccine

As many of you probably also heard this morning, there is a safe, effective vaccine for Lyme Disease, but thanks to ignorance and fear mongering, it's not available. Sweet!

http://www.wbur.org/2012/06/27/lyme-vaccine

I got the vaccine when it first came out and paid it out of pocket. I do recall going to get a booster and being told it was no longer available.

Sure wish it would make a comeback.

I had arthritis long before I ever got my Lyme vaccine.

I received the Lyme vaccine that was available about 15 yeas ago (and removed from the market). The antibodies I generated from the vaccine caused me to show false positves on clinical tests for rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosis- two autoimmune diseases I DO NOT have. IIRC, the vaccine I received was removed from the market shortly after I got it. If I were to develop them- diagnosis would be complicated because of the Lyme vaccine interference. Not something I was fully informed of when I accepted the vaccine.

Vaccines are a tricky thing - my personal feeling is that they can cause more harm than good.

With respect to Lyme Disease, I have had it twice - 20 and 15 years ago. I truly sympathize with those who have suffered serious complications from Lyme - but as I understand it, these cases are rare.

Given my experience with the earlier vaccine, I will continue to take my chances with Lyme.

Edited to say that I was not a part of any legal action.

una_dogger said:

...Vaccines are a tricky thing - my personal feeling is that they can cause more harm than good...

Click to expand...

Presumably, you are not referring to MMR, polio, small pox, etc.

Nope!

I absolutely believe in vaccination against life threatening diseases that carry significant risk of epidemic and large scale death, crippling effects, or disfigurement - just think the risks Of a vaccine must outweigh its benefit and the Lyme vaccine, when administered to dogs, is only about 80% effective.

Like I said, just my opinion . There is a proven risk of certain leukemias from vaccines prepared from Simian Retroviruses - i think the public deserves full disclosure on the risks vs benefit of vaccination.
That's not fear mongering - that's transparency. Companies can and will create a vaccine for anything under the sun, it's HUGE profits for them.


And up front let me please apologize for any gaps or bluntness in my post - I'm posting from an IPhone and well, its tough to be eloquent ;-)


A starting point for anyone interested
http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Risk/sv40/o

una_dogger said:

A starting point for anyone interested
http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Risk/sv40/o

Click to expand...

That's a bad link, did you mean this?
http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Risk/sv40/

That link refers to whether the polio vaccine between 1955 & early-1963, which was contaminated with Simian Virus 40, which wasn't known to have existed until 1960, and possibility that it increased the risk for some rare forms of tumors in humans, primarily a form of lung cancer. The article concludes with: "The Institute of Medicine (IOM) issued a report in October 2002, which concluded that the scientific evidence was insufficient to prove or disprove the theory that exposure to poliovirus vaccine contaminated with SV40 resulted in cancer in humans."

As I understand it, Lyme disease can have crippling effects on people and, according to the CDC, "Lyme disease is the most commonly reported vectorborne illness in the U.S. In 2009, it was the 5th most common Nationally Notifiable disease."

I apologize to anyone who has suffered serious long term effects from Lyme.

Having had both the infection (twice) and the vaccine - I can state for myself that I have no long term effect from the infection, but I do have long term effects from the vaccine.

Thanks for my repairing link - and I did state i was posting it as a starting point for anyone interested in ongoing research on vaccine risks. There is tons of ongoing research investigating links between vaccines and cancer (and other diseases) and frankly - I don't consider the prescense of a simian or
Murine retrovirus incorporated into the genetic structure of a tumor in a human who has recieved a vaccine produced from the
source virus something to not be concerned with - what is inconclusive is if it caused the tumor.

My point - I think long and hard before injecting something into my body - especially if it's not going to be wildly effective. And especially for an infection that in most cases responds to basic antibiotic therapy.


Just my personal position on it - not going to beat a dead horse -- that's all I got

una_dogger said:

I apologize to anyone who has suffered serious long term effects from Lyme.

Click to expand...

I'll jump in here as one many of you know suffer from the effects of long term Lyme. I'm not at all offended by anything Una_dogger wrote. Absolutely true that we as a human race have to be careful about what we think we can protect ourselves from, both physically and metaphysically. The current good news with Lyme is that now so many more people and physicians are aware of Lyme (unfortunately due to the growing numbers of deer ticks) and that people are beginning to demand, and doctors agree to give, a short burst of antibiotics if a tick has been attached. Better yet will be clearer ways to identify and treat the disease. Lets talk about false rumors regarding disease, too. Most still agree that dog (wood) ticks do not carry the same disease as causes Lyme, but some are beginning to fear that. At least wood ticks are much easier to identify because of their size. But that doesn't mean we are out of the woods.

An interesting experiment I did last Sunday when I saw a deer tick on the picnic table of a great homemade ice cream stand in Belmont (Jordon's). I saw the tick heading my way in no uncertain terms, like a horse to its stable at the end of the day. I put my finger on the table in front of it, knowing I had some 100% Deet on it, and watched the tick spin away from me and head in another direction! (Yes, we killed it with a crushing defeat, using our ice cream spoons!)

una_dogger said:

Companies can and will create a vaccine for anything under the sun, it's HUGE profits for them.

Click to expand...

I also don't wish to beat a dead horse, but your statement suggests that development of a vaccine for just about anything is trivial, and that doing so is an easy money maker for any company that has the will to do so. These statements are WILDLY fallacious.

Specificially, just how easy is it to develop a vaccine for, say, HIV? What exactly has 28 years of effort from a sea of both academic and industrial researchers yielded, and where are the HUGE profits?

I like this quite a bit:

una_dogger said:

My point - I think long and hard before injecting something into my body - especially if it's not going to be wildly effective. And especially for an infection that in most cases responds to basic antibiotic therapy..

Click to expand...

That thought process right there - a very smart and well-reasoned thought process - is almost certainly the main reason the lyme disease vaccine was NOT profitable and was therefore pulled from the market. Although I suspect coincidental timing with the (falsified) MMR vaccine-autism link didn't help.

Do I think the re-marketing of a vaccine for Lyme Disease to the largely insured population here in the northeast could be a profit maker? Yes, I do. Especially since its already been developed for veterinary use and it's development has potentially already paid for itself in that venue.

Do I think the development of a vaccine for something I feel extremely beneficial to humankind, say HIV, would be available if the majority of those affected could pay for it? You betcha. And that just sucks. Case in point:
http://www.vaccineethics.org/issue_briefs/HIV_overview.php
: AIDS vaccine research is overwhelmingly driven by the public and philanthropic sectors. The HIV Vaccines and Microbicides Resource Tracking Working Group estimates that in 2006 the pharmaceutical industry spent approximately $79 million on AIDS vaccine research, only 8% percent of the total $933 million spent worldwide.8 Dr. Edward Tramont, Director of the Division of AIDS at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has suggested that drug companies lack incentives to create an HIV vaccine and are likely to wait to profit from a government-developed vaccin e

Call me a conspiracy theorist if you want - I do think profits drive, and while mine may be considered fallacious arguments, that doesn't necessarily make them incorrect


Here is a potential concern that I've been pondering today...it's not clear why some patients who contract the Lyme infection respond so strongly - how do we know if these same people may suffer
An equally strong negative consequence from the vaccine? To suffer the consequences without ever being infected would be very sad, indeed.

It would be unrealistic to think that a cost:benefit ratio is not built into everything that businesses do. A lot of experimentation goes on. It's the same in the medical world as it is in the world of education and in the world of hiking gear. Science is not exact. Preferences and theories change. What's old is new is old again. To me and mine, my concerns are overriding. Your's aren't, world?

Here is another reason carnivores may want to avoid ticks

http://news.yahoo.com/allergic-meat-lone-star-tick-may-vegetarians-133418695--abc-news-health.html

I just read about a story where people in Massachusetts are considering a "legislative remedy" for Lyme. I wonder if it will be a shot in the arm?

http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120625/NEWS/206250313

una_dogger said:

Do I think the re-marketing of a vaccine for Lyme Disease to the largely insured population here in the northeast could be a profit maker? Yes, I do.

Click to expand...

Well, it's fine that you think that, but the experiment has already been done and the results are in. GSK pulled the vaccine for lack of demand. If it were such a HUGE money maker, why would they possibly pull it off the market? Is the market so different now than it was in 2002? Are more people insured? Now, maybe you have information that the analysts on Wall Street and the market researchers within the pharmaceutical industry do not have, and that's how you know it would be profitable. Maybe all of these people who analyze market trends within the industry have it all wrong. If you're quite confident in your viewpoint, of course you could gather up all of your funds, maybe borrow a bit from your family, and possibly hit up some VC's (I'm sure they'd be all for it, it's an OBVIOUS winner) and license the vaccine from GSK and sell it yourself. Why not? You're sure to make a bundle. But you might ask yourself exacly why GSK has not done just that, considering that they own the patents, invented the technology, have appropriate facilities and really just need to press go.

Now, I don't really understand what your point was in including this:

una_dogger said:

Do I think the development of a vaccine for something I feel extremely beneficial to humankind, say HIV, would be available if the majority of those affected could pay for it? You betcha. And that just sucks. Case in point:
http://www.vaccineethics.org/issue_briefs/HIV_overview.php
: AIDS vaccine research is overwhelmingly driven by the public and philanthropic sectors. The HIV Vaccines and Microbicides Resource Tracking Working Group estimates that in 2006 the pharmaceutical industry spent approximately $79 million on AIDS vaccine research, only 8% percent of the total $933 million spent worldwide.8 Dr. Edward Tramont, Director of the Division of AIDS at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has suggested that drug companies lack incentives to create an HIV vaccine and are likely to wait to profit from a government-developed vaccine

Click to expand...

It seems like you're just reinforcing my point, i.e. that inventing a vaccine is extremely difficult, and often not profitable. Am I missing something?

I stand by my statement: to suggest that vaccines are trivial to invent and HUGELY profitable is WILDLY fallacious (and also incorrect).

You further reinforce the point with:

una_dogger said:

To suffer the consequences without ever being infected would be very sad, indeed.

Click to expand...

Correct. Perhaps without knowing it, you speak to one of the biggest challenges in developing vaccines: meeting the safety requirements. You're giving this compound to healthy people, many of whom are children. Think there's no risk here? Easy money? Think again.

I do think Lyme disease has risen since 2002, yes - and I think the demand for the vaccine will be greater now as a result.

I certainly don't mean you any disrespect, Hiker Brian - your points are thoughtful and well made...I'm
sticking with my opinions, no matter how flawed they may seem to you - happy to agree to disagree

Have a great day!

I can raise a glass to that (well, a cup - of coffee...). Cheers, Una!

It might be worth noting that the article on Lyme Disease Vaccine referenced in the initial post is part of a series on Lyme disease: "Living with Lyme" http://www.wbur.org/series/living-with-lyme

Doug

I live on Eastern Long Island's North Fork (with deer and mice all around me) I work on Shelter Island (deer tick central) I have had Lyme and Babesiosis. After all is said and done... lets go hiking! When I backpacked in Glacier Nat Park there was a fatal grizzly attack, when I went to Paraguay there was yellow fever, in Chile I had a big earthquake experience, Mexico the same, Easter Island (Rapa Nui): Dengue. Unfortunately that's life on planet earth! The sign over the maternity ward should read "No one gets out of life alive". Do your best. Wear you seat belt. Don't smoke cigarettes and enjoy the ride the best you can.

una_dogger said:

I do think Lyme disease has risen since 2002, yes - and I think the demand for the vaccine will be greater now as a result.

Click to expand...

Yes -- it has risen in the past decade, and in some areas of the country, quite dramatically.

There are all sorts of fun facts (by state, by gender, country-wide, etc.) here to support this notion on the CDC's web site.

The CDC is a good place to start looking for information, but readers should keep in mind that there are reliable organizations that have opposing views on especially the treatment of long term, or chronic lyme disease. The CDC, even recently, was more relunctant than they are now to have information on Lyme, so they are beginning to see things a little differently. One organization to look at is: http://lymedisease.org/news/touchedbylyme/239.html