Eighty-six organizations in 10 countries have joined the Ad Hoc Patient and Physician Coalition, protesting the IDSA Lyme guidelines. (Update: 87 groups in 11 countries)

Countries represented include: the US, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, Belgium, Latvia and Spain. (Update: and Poland)

The coalition is spearheaded by LymeDisease.org and the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS).

It came together after the Infectious Diseases Society of America posted a draft of its new guidelines in June, inviting public comment.

LymeDisease.org’s Lorraine Johnson and Dr. Betty Maloney, of ILADS, prepared a comprehensive rebuttal to the guidelines, and soon, other groups publicly endorsed their comments.

The most recent group to join the effort is ALCE Asociación Lyme Crónico España (the Spanish Association of Chronic Lyme). In its message to us, ALCE said: “We are extremely grateful for all the work Lymedisease organization is doing for this cause, since it has an impact on all the people affected in the world.”

In the United States, the IDSA’s restrictive Lyme treatment guidelines are often viewed as mandates by physicians, state health officials, medical boards, insurance companies, and the courts.

They have been used to deny treatment, insurance coverage, and the medical licenses of Lyme-treating doctors throughout the country.

Although the IDSA is based in the US, its Lyme guidelines have been adopted by health departments in many other countries, too. This makes it hard for people with Lyme to get diagnosed and treated in those places, as well.

New IDSA guidelines deny Lyme diagnosis to most of the US

Read our rebuttal to the guidelines: Ad Hoc Patient-Physician Coalition Comments Sept 6

See which groups have signed on: 87 organizations, 11 countries (Sept. 26)