A Maryland Lyme activist takes an IDSA apologist to task, quite eloquently.

The commentary is in response to one on Lyme disease and medical legislation by David Itkin, MD, of Portsmouth, published Sunday, June 6.

It was obvious by the cookie-cutter letter that Dr. Itkin wrote that he is an Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) supporter. It’s shameful, but it appears the IDSA has enlisted another patsy to promote their "we are the world" symphony to enlighten the uneducated and try to convince the sick they aren’t really sick after all.

Some members in the IDSA’s camp, like Dr. Itkin, claim publicly to have compassion for patients who remain ill after their recommended "cost-effective", insurance friendly treatment protocol fails to cure patients.

Rather than treat the sick, as the doctor admits he doesn’t, he instead offers them a 45-minute lecture telling them they are either sick with something else (of course doctors can’t be wrong), have mysteriously become mentally ill after having a documented tick bite and positive Lyme tests, or are gullible enough to simply think they are benefiting from a placebo effect when they do get better with appropriate treatment.

The doctor did share one thought most can agree with, "The patient-doctor relationship should allow for an individualized approach, for this or any illness." Yet in the same breath he is against a bill (not sure he read it) that provides patients and the doctors treating them a choice of treatment, unlike his beloved IDSA guidelines.

The bill does not promote a specific treatment; it only allows choices for both doctors and patients, without fear of prosecution.

I truly wish those being sucked into the IDSA’s web (for whatever reason) would take the time to actually read the IDSA guidelines to see how restrictive and ridiculous they actually are and read the bills they continue to fight before they ring-a-ding-ding the old worn out chant … "I don’t know what you have, but it isn’t Lyme disease and you don’t need treatment for it."

They should also read the final report that indicates the IDSA was being way too big for its britches when it wrote the guidelines and states they need to knock down their ratings for their recommendations or actually provide proof to support them.

If people only realized how unscientific, nonsensical, self-promoting and full of conflicts of interest the IDSA guidelines were, they too would back as far away as possible from the handful of guideline authors who keep pushing them, lest they go down with the ship too. After all, if Camp A was right, there wouldn’t be a Camp B.

On the web:

www.MarylandLyme.org