Lyme Disease is on the increase and it can be a particularly debilitating condition. If you've been bitten by a tick and you suspect that you might have contracted Lyme Disease, you should go to your GP as soon as possible. Unfortunately, there's a fair chance that he/she'll have no idea what you're blabbering on about. Even if they do know, there's (allegedly) a lack of proper clinical guidelines for dealing with the condition. This needs to be put right, as early and ongoing proper treatment is much more successful than delayed action.
To this end, Gill Reese of Lyme Disease Action has raised an online petition, which can be found at http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Lyme-guidelines/ .
Here's the pitch:
We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to put in place Clinical Guidelines, SPECIFIC to the United Kingdom, for the diagnosis and treatment of all patients, including children, who have acquired Lyme disease or associated Tick-borne diseases.
These guidelines should be part of a national strategy to combat this increasingly common threat to health in the United Kingdom and should address the UK presentation of Lyme disease and other emerging Tick-borne Diseases.
Please sign the petition (and get as many others as possible to sign) before it closes on April 7th. The current number of signatories is 1775 - that's nowhere near enough.
Thank you.
