New Kind Of Lyme Disease Discovered

  • 8 years ago
A new species of bacteria is producing Lyme disease. For awhile, only one bacterium in North America was known to cause the disease. This year, researchers at Mayo Clinic testing blood and synovial fluid samples from people infected with Lyme disease discovered infections that did not trace to the known bacterium. In addition to a rash, fever and other classic Lyme symptoms, those patients also had confusion, nausea and vomiting. The mayo team reported that A previously unknown species of bacterium was causing the disease. The patients recovered after receiving the same antibiotics that treat Lyme disease. For now, samples taken from ticks show that this version is only found in the Upper Midwest.