American Association for the Advancement of Science
Volume 260(5114) 11 June 1993 pp 1610-1616
The Biological and Social Phenomenon of Lyme Disease
Barbour, Alan G.; Fish, Durland
A. G. Barbour is in the Departments of Microbiology and Medicine, University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio, TX 78284. D. Fish is in the Medical Entomology Laboratory, Department of Community and Preventive Medicine, New York Medical College, Valhalla, NY 10595.
Outline
• Abstract
• The Origins of Lyme Disease in North America
• Maintenance of Borrelia burgdorferi in Nature
• Biology of Borrelia burgdorferi
• Dilemmas in Diagnosis and Case Management
• Surveillance for Lyme Disease
• Prevention Through Immunization
• Prevention Through Vector Control
• Conclusion
• REFERENCES AND NOTES
Graphics
• Figure 1
• Figure 2
Abstract
Lyme disease, unknown in the United States two decades ago, is now the most common arthropod-borne disease in the country and has caused considerable morbidity in several suburban and rural areas. The emergence of this disease is in part the consequence of the reforestation of the northeastern United States and the rise in deer populations. Unfortunately, an accurate estimation of its importance to human and animal health has not been made because of difficulties in diagnosis and inadequate surveillance activities. Strategies for prevention of Lyme disease include vector control and vaccines.
Lyme disease is a zoonosis, an inadvertent infection of humans with an animal pathogen. In
temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere, ticks transmit the etiologic bacterium Borrelia
burgdorferi from its usual wildlife reservoirs to humans and domestic animals [1,2]. In the
United States, Lyme disease occurs primarily in suburban and rural areas [3]. Early infection of
humans is usually a self-limited, flu-like illness with a skin rash where the tick imbeds itself [4]
Figure 1. After a few weeks to several months, as many as 70% of untreated, infected patients
suffer the effects of bacterial invasion of one or more distant organs or systems, including the
brain, nerves, eyes, joints, and heart [5]. These late manifestations, particularly the dysfunction
of the central nervous system and chronic arthritis, are disabling but rarely fatal [5].
In the United States during 1991, 9465 cases of Lyme disease were formally reported, making it
by far the most common arthropod-borne disease [6]. The rising incidence and geographic spread
of this zoonosis have interested the general public [7]. Lyme disease probably ranks only behind
acquired immunodeficiency syndrome in media coverage of infectious diseases in the United
States over the last decade. News, public health programs, and patient advocacy groups have
informed the public of the symptoms of Lyme disease and of ways to avoid infection [8]. A less
salubrious consequence of the attention has been the attribution to B. burgdorferi of a number of
ills, only a fraction of which are likely to be Lyme disease [9,10]. Wisconsin had 545 reported
cases of Lyme disease in 1989; in the same year, 94,000 serum samples were received by
reference laboratories in the state for Lyme disease testing [11]. Georgia reported hundreds of
cases of Lyme disease until it was documented that there were few ticks bearing B. burgdorferi
in the state [12].
A provisional diagnosis of Lyme disease is often acceptable to patients with vexing, undefined
illnesses, not only because there is hope for a cure with antibiotics but also because Lyme
disease is acquired through what are generally perceived to be wholesome activities, such as
hiking and working out-of-doors [7]. The full extent to which people are being inappropriately
treated with antibiotics cannot be estimated at present, but it is likely that a large minority, if not
a majority, of the health care dollars expended on therapy for Lyme disease are for inaccurate
diagnoses of B. burgdorferi infection [9,10]. Some of these resources would better benefit the
community if directed toward methods of disease prevention, such as vector control. A zoonosis
can be characterized with respect to the microbiology of the agent, the ecology in relation to
vectors and reservoir hosts, and the epidemiology of human disease. Full description of the
phenomenon of Lyme disease will also require consideration of behavioral and economic factors
in the response to the disease's emergence. These social factors are still poorly understood.
The Origins of Lyme Disease in North America
The clinical syndrome of B. burgdorferi infection had been described in Europe [13] more than
six decades before Steere and colleagues in 1975 investigated an unusual cluster of childhood
arthritis in the coastal community of Lyme, Connecticut [14]. Soon after the Connecticut
investigation, the relation between the arthritis and a prior episode of the characteristic skin rash,
erythema migrans Figure 1, common in Europe, was noted [15]. The search for an etiologic
agent implicated a tick, Ixodes scapularis (I. dammini), as the vector on epidemiological grounds
[16]. The bite of a related species, I. ricinus, was known to cause erythema migrans in Europe
[17]. Identity between the two tick-borne conditions was established when B. burgdorferi was
first isolated from I. scapularis and I. ricinus and then from patients in the United States and
Europe with Lyme disease and erythema migrans [18].
The events leading to an epidemic of arthritis in residents of Lyme began several centuries
earlier. Infections from B. burgdorferi probably occurred in North America before the first
waves of European colonization. Erythema migrans, the hallmark of B. burgdorferi infection,
was already present in midwestern and Pacific states at the time Lyme disease was first described
in Connecticut [19]. Early descriptions of colonial forests, the abundance of deer, and ticks
annoying explorers suggest that the conditions for B. burgdorferi transmission were present in
the Northeast hundreds of years ago [20,21]. The generally benign nature of acute B. burgdorferi
infection relative to the debilitating and fatal effects of diseases plaguing North Americans
through the 19th century may have contributed to its obscurity until a cluster of cases of
childhood arthritis first brought it to wider attention on this continent.
The ecological changes in the northeastern and midwestern United States during this century are
responsible for the recent emergence of Lyme disease as a public health problem [1,22]. The
establishment of an endemic focus of B. burgdorferi in these areas is primarily dependent on
ecological conditions favorable for deer. The white-tailed deer is a keystone host for I. scapularis
populations, and the maintenance of B. burgdorferi is in turn dependent on the presence of I.
scapularis [23,24]. Deforestation of much of the Northeast during the 18th and 19th centuries
resulted in the near total elimination of deer, and presumably also of deer ticks [20,21].
However, deer were never totally eliminated from a few isolated areas, such as Long Island, New
York [20]. Both entomological collection records and polymerase chain reaction analysis of
museum specimens document the presence of B. burgdorferi and I. scapularis on Long Island 50
years ago [25].
The abandonment of farms in New England and in suburban metropolitan areas elsewhere in the
Northeast resulted in a change in the landscape through natural succession from open fields to
eastern deciduous forests. As the forests returned, so did the deer. The invasion by I. scapularis
of the increasingly reforested mainland from island refuges initiated the current epidemic of
Lyme disease in the Northeast; the closest mainland community from Long Island's
northernmost tip is Lyme. There is evidence that several independent mainland invasions by I.
scapularis took place, resulting in early Lyme disease foci in central New Jersey, mainland
Westchester County, New York, southeastern Connecticut, and eastern Massachusetts [26,27].
The population of I. scapularis in north-central states appears to be expanding its range
independently from an indigenous relict population [28].
The threat of Lyme disease in wooded, suburban residential communities such as Westchester
County [29,30] has resulted in a new sense of conflict between humans and nature. Because the
extremely small nymphs of I. scapularis commonly transmit B. burgdorferi to people, relatively
few cases of Lyme disease are associated with recognized tick bites [4]. The resulting fear of
nymphal I. scapularis in residential yards, school grounds, and nature preserves has had a
negative impact on public attitudes about deer and nature in some of the most desirable
residential areas of the Northeast [31].
Maintenance of Borrelia burgdorferi in Nature
Lyme disease occurs in environments where the distributions of competent vectors, B.
burgdorferi, and wildlife reservoir hosts overlap. Among Borrelia species, B. burgdorferi is
remarkable in the variety of tick and vertebrate hosts it can infect; the several species that cause
relapsing fever have much more limited ranges of hosts and vectors [32]. Competent vectors
involved in the transmission of B. burgdorferi to humans are members of the I. persulcatus group
of ticks, including I. scapularis and I. pacificus in eastern and western North America,
respectively, and I. ricinus and I. persulcatus of Europe and Eurasia, respectively [33,34]. Some
species outside this group have also been shown as competent enzootic vectors [35].
The northern form of I. scapularis, which is responsible for more than 80% of the Lyme disease
cases in North America, was described as a separate species, I. dammini, in 1979 [36]. Although
the northern and southern forms have distinguishable morphological and ecological
characteristics, the species status of I. dammini has recently been rejected because of mating
compatibility and genetic similarity between the two forms [37]. The immature stages, larvae
and nymphs, of the northern form feed on all terrestrial mammal species and on as many as half
of the bird species that occur in the eastern deciduous-forest ecosystem [38,39]. Many
mammalian and avian species are reservoir-competent and capable of infecting larvae with B.
burgdorferi during their 4-day feeding event. The white-footed mouse, Peromyscus leucopus, is
of primary importance as a reservoir species throughout the northern range of I. scapularis, but
other small and medium-sized mammals, as well as birds, can also be important locally
[27,38,40,41]. Engorged larvae molt and overwinter as nymphs, which seek hosts again the
following summer. Infected nymphs transmit spirochetes to reservoir-competent hosts just before
the maximum host-seeking activity of the next generation's larvae. The exploitation of reservoir
hosts for the transmittal of spirochetes between tick generations in the near absence of inherited
(transovarial) transmission results in infection rates that average 25% in unfed nymphs [1,41,42].
Spirochete prevalence in adult ticks averages 50%, in part because an adult has two chances of
acquiring an infectious blood meal, having fed as both a larva and a nymph. The prevalence of B.
burgdorferi infection in vector-competent ticks varies geographically and is a good predictor of
Lyme disease incidence.
The endemic cycle of B. burgdorferi, and the consequent epidemiology of Lyme disease, varies
among geographic locations. In the southern United States, immature I. scapularis feeds
primarily on lizards, which are reservoir-incompetent [43]. Consequently, nymphal and adult
infection rates are less than 1%, about the expected rate for transovarial passage [44]. Spirochete
infection rates are also 1 to 5% in I. pacificus. Although transovarial passage contributes to this
infection rate, it is not sufficient to explain the maintenance of endemic foci in the western
United States [45]. A transmission cycle involving I. neotomae and the dusky-footed woodrat
Neotoma fuscipes was found responsible for the maintenance of endemic foci in California.
Because I. neotomae is host-specific and not anthropophilic, the few larval and nymphal I.
pacificus that feed on reservoir-competent mammals rather than lizards are responsible for
transmitting B. burgdorferi to humans [33,46].
In Europe I. ricinus and in the former Soviet Union I. persulcatus have feeding ecologies similar
to that of northern I. scapularis: immatures feed primarily on mammals and birds [47].
Consequently, spirochete infection rates in these tick species can be as high as that found in I.
scapularis of the northeastern United States [48]. Reservoir-competent hosts reported for I.
ricinus include the mice Apodemus flavicollis and A. sylvaticus as well as a vole, Clethrionomys
glareolus [49]. The epizootiology of Lyme disease is more complex in Europe and Asia than in
the United States because of the greater diversity of landscapes and ecology. Enzootic cycles
involving the hedgehog tick, I. hexagonus, in Switzerland and the avian tick, I. uriae, in Sweden
have been described [50]. Recovery of organisms like B. burgdorferi from I. ovatus in Japan and
Haemaphysalis longicornis in China [51], both of which primarily parasitize man and domestic
animals, indicates even greater diversity of endemic cycles and vectors in Asia. A tick-associated
disease similar to Lyme disease has been described in Australia [52], but the agent has not yet
been successfully isolated from ticks, wildlife, or patients. There have been reports of B.
burgdorferi in other tick species in North America, including Dermacentor variabilis, I. cookei,
and Amblyomma americanum [53]. Although borrelias can be acquired by these species during
feeding, these ticks have not been shown to be competent for transmission of the borrelias to
other hosts [54]. The presence of spirochetes similar to B. burgdorferi in A. americanum in areas
where competent vectors are absent is inexplicable.
Biology of Borrelia burgdorferi
Like other spirochetes, B. burgdorferi has a wavy shape and flagella that lie between the outer
and inner membranes of the cell [32]. All Borrelia sp. are host-associated bacteria and usually
shuttle between a vertebrate and a hematophagous arthropod. They do not live in water, soil, or
plants and are not transmitted by aerosols or fecal contamination. Although spirochetes are
predominantly extracellular pathogens, they invade endothelial layers to pass into tissues,
including the brain [55]. Species of Borrelia differ from other spirochetes in that they have a
chromosome and several extrachromosomal elements that are linear rather than circular [56,57].
Most U.S. isolates, as well as some strains from western Europe, are still included under the
original species designation B. burgdorferi [58]. Other strains, such as those from northern and
eastern Europe, Russia, and Asia, represent two other genomic groups, on the basis of DNA
relatedness and ribosomal RNA sequences [58]. A further justification for the division of extant
B. burgdorferi strains into two or more species would be consistent differences between strains
in their associated diseases. The most compelling evidence for this difference appears in the
infrequency of joint swelling and inflammation as sequelae of acute infection in northern and
eastern Europe as compared to the United States [59]. This difference does not seem to result
from acquisition bias. The absence of ``arthritogenic'' strains may help to explain the rarity of
chronic arthritis after erythema migrans in regions of Europe and Russia. Aside from its
taxonomic value, this difference in disease expression may provide insight into the pathogenesis
of other chronic arthritides, such as rheumatoid arthritis, for which an etiologic agent is not
known [60].
Two major contributors to antigenic distinctness of B. burgdorferi in North America are the
surface-exposed lipoproteins OspA, the focus of vaccine efforts, and OspB [61]. They or other
lipoproteins are anchored in an outer membrane that is more fluid than that of Gram-negative
bacteria [62]. In the least variable of the two proteins, OspA [63], there are three major groups
that differ from each other in their primary sequences by 21 to 23% [64]. Both OspA and OspB
are cotranscribed from an operon located on linear plasmids of about 50 kilobases [56]. The ends
of the linear plasmids are hairpins that most closely resemble in structure and sequence the
telomeres of poxviruses and the iridovirus that causes African swine fever [65]. The African
swine fever virus and a related Borrelia species, B. duttoni, live in the same tick vector,
Ornithodorus moubata, in Africa. The unusual genomic structure and organization of Borrelia
sp. may be the result of a trans-kingdom genetic exchange in the past [65].
Dilemmas in Diagnosis and Case Management
In an area where there is a high incidence of Lyme disease, such as Westchester County, the
presentation in July of a patient with low-grade fever, muscle aches, and erythema migrans
Figure 1 poses few diagnostic or therapeutic problems [66,67]. On clinical and epidemiologic
grounds, this condition would likely be early B. burgdorferi infection, and in most instances
prompt treatment with oral antibiotics such as amoxicillin or doxycycline would be curative
[65,68]. However, if a skin lesion is absent, a situation that may occur in 10% or more of
infections [4,5], nothing in the clinical presentation can clearly distinguish early Lyme disease
from other acute, febrile summer illnesses of temperate latitudes. Later manifestations of Lyme
disease, such as arthritis or carditis, can be attributed to other disorders. Neurologic symptoms,
especially those involving changes in cognitive functions, are especially difficult to interpret [69-
71]. Moreover, factors such as the premorbid personality and a tendency to somatization may
determine the length of convalescence and the response to postinfection fatigue and joint aches
[71,72]. Even if the original diagnosis of Lyme disease is undisputed, lingering or recurrent
symptoms, many of which are also characteristic of chronic fatigue syndrome or fibromyalgia,
may not be attributable to persistent infection [9,10,70,73].
In cases in which the hallmark skin rash is not observed, laboratory assays assume a more
important role in diagnosis [66,67]. A tentative diagnosis would be validated by isolation of the
agent from the patient, but this standard is seldom achieved in practice [7]. After a few weeks of
infection, B. burgdorferi is rarely if ever present in the blood; in other involved tissues, such as
joints or nerves, organisms are scarce [74]. The more commonly performed diagnostic procedure
is a serologic test, usually an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay at a commercial laboratory,
for antibodies to B. burgdorferi at a single point in time. However, a positive serology result may
be incidental to the patient's disorder. In areas without Lyme disease, 1 to 2% of residents have
antibodies that sufficiently cross-react with B. burgdorferi antigens to give a false positive test
result [75]. In some endemic areas, 10% of healthy residents have serologic evidence of past
infection with B. burgdorferi [75]. Skepticism about serologic assays has also been raised by
surveys that show unacceptably high variation in results between different diagnostic
laboratories [76]. Test irreproducibility is attributable in part to lack of a standardized assay. In
the absence of leadership by the federal government in standardizing assays and assessing
proficiency, a cottage industry for Lyme disease testing has developed [7].
When opportunities or resources to confirm the presence of an infection by specific laboratory
tests are nonexistent or limited, antibiotics are often used empirically [77]. An inherent problem,
though, for this empirical approach is the lack of a clear endpoint for treatment. Late Lyme
disease is not likely to show a clear improvement within the time frame of the therapy, at least
not for the standardly recommended period. Not surprisingly, there is controversy about whether
the appropriate treatment duration for chronic Lyme disease is measured in weeks or months
[5,68,78]. When antibiotics are given parenterally for weeks, the direct and indirect costs of
administration of drugs are considerable for patients and thirdparty payers [79]. Studies of
antibiotics for Lyme disease therapy have often been funded by pharmaceutical companies; the
emphasis in these studies has been on antibiotics still under patent protection [80].
Decisions on diagnostic criteria, treatment strategies, research-funding allocation, and insurance
reimbursement are being made. Policy-makers are under pressure from some health professionals
and lay persons who believe that the spectrum of B. burgdorferi disease is broader than the limits
accepted by most peer-reviewed medical journals. The conditions in this larger set include
degenerative, inflammatory, and neuropsychiatric conditions not previously thought to be
ameliorated by antibiotics [81]. Alternative views of diagnostic criteria and treatment strategies
have been presented primarily at regional meetings sponsored by patient advocacy groups and in
newsletters devoted to Lyme disease. More recently, the influence of these points of view on the
last international scientific meeting on Lyme disease was such that several additional abstracts,
which had originally been rejected, were permitted presentation [82].
Surveillance for Lyme Disease
Misdiagnosis and inappropriate treatment could be lessened by improved surveillance of known
and emerging endemic foci. Clinical case distributions in the United States often do not coincide
with the known geographic distribution of endemic foci [83]. Travel to endemic foci accounts for
only a small fraction of the disparities. As with other vector-borne diseases, a history of exposure
to Lyme disease in an endemic area is an important consideration in diagnosis. Unfortunately,
the need for active surveillance of Lyme disease comes at a time when state and local
governmental budget cuts have reduced or eliminated many vector surveillance activities [84].
Current estimates of Lyme disease distribution are made principally from reports of human cases
Figure 2. However, inasmuch as humans are not involved in the natural maintenance cycle of B.
burgdorferi, the endemic status of this infection is not dependent on human involvement.
Spirochetes are far more frequent in wildlife and in ticks than in humans [67,85]. In terms of
surveillance, efforts to isolate the spirochete from ticks or reservoir hosts are more efficacious
than isolation attempts from patients [86]. Reservoir mice are particularly useful for surveillance
because B. burgdorferi can be cultured from their internal organs or ear punch biopsies, and they
are generally infected for life [87]. Polymerase chain reaction analysis will most likely replace
the use of cultures for this purpose [88].
Better knowledge of the geographic distribution and local abundance of vectors would improve
assessments of human risk. Although a national tick survey is only now under way in this
country [12], distribution maps for I. ricinus and I. persulcatus have been available for nearly 20
years in Europe and Russia [89]. Methods for quantitative assessment of vector abundance and
the application of remote sensing technology for the mapping of tick-borne disease distributions
are more advanced in central Europe and the former Soviet Union than in the United States
[28,90]. Decades of experience with and study of tick-borne viral encephalitis in Europe and
Asia have resulted in accurate knowledge of the geographic distributions of I. ricinus and I.
persulcatus.
The changing nature of the distribution and abundance of I. scapularis in the northern United
States complicates the surveillance of this vector. Invasions into areas previously free of I.
scapularis continue to occur [91], and establishment in new areas can be rapid and unpredictable
[92]; the ultimate limits of its distribution are uncertain. A steady increase in vector abundance at
a single location in Westchester County has been observed over a period of 5 years [27]. Such
changes in vector abundance can cause difficulties in the prediction of risk and in the assessment
of the efficacy of preventive measures, whether interventional or educational.
Prevention Through Immunization
Until recently there was no consensus that a human vaccine against Lyme disease was a realistic
prevention strategy, let alone profitable for a company to produce. A vaccine for a more
frequently fatal tick-borne disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, was taken off the market for
lack of use [93]. Moreover, human and animal studies indicate that the pathologic changes in
Lyme disease are determined in part by the host's immune response [94]. Until disease
pathogeneis and immunity are better understood, the risk of provoking disease through
vaccination cannot be accurately predicted. Because Lyme disease is rarely fatal, societal
tolerance of untoward reactions from the vaccine would probably be low.
Despite these discouraging considerations, demand for preventive measures against Lyme
disease has prompted efforts to develop a human vaccine for the disease [95]. One justification
for this effort is the accumulated evidence over the last decade that the morbidity from B.
burgdorferi infection in highly endemic areas is considerable; in some areas, 10% of the
population has been infected [96]. Some patients with Lyme disease involving the joints or
nervous system do not improve substantially even after parenteral antibiotic therapy [69-71,97].
Although doubts remain about many diagnoses of chronic Lyme disease, the specter of a large
number of persons with unrelieved disabilities prompts further consideration of a B. burgdorferi
vaccine for high-risk populations, such as outdoor workers and residents of endemic areas.
The feasibility of a human vaccine was demonstrated with experimental infections of animals.
Passive and active protection against homologous challenge was obtained in hamsters
immunized with killed B. burgdorferi cells [98]. These findings were the basis for the
commercially developed vaccine for dogs, which in an experimental infection study provided
evidence of protection [99]. However, because of concerns about the safety of whole-cell
vaccines, the initial focus for a human vaccine has been on recombinant DNA products. Most
work has been done on the OspA lipoprotein. The ability of recombinant OspA to induce an
immune response against B. burgdorferi was first demonstrated with rabbits and subsequently
with mice and hamsters [100,101]. Mice immunized with recombinant OspA were protected
against challenge from borrelias that were delivered by syringe and by tick [101,102]. The lipid
moiety of OspA is necessary for protection in mice when no adjuvants or adjuvants approved for
human use are used [103]. Phase I human trials of recombinant OspA lipoprotein have begun
[104].
Prevention Through Vector Control
Most vector-borne diseases are prevented through vector control and not by vaccines for humans.
However, relatively few methods to control ticks that influence public health have been
developed, in contrast to measures of mosquito control, for instance. Consequently, reduction of
the risk of Lyme disease through reduction of tick exposure has been limited to insecticide use
and personal protection measures. In regions where tick infection rates are low or where
exposure is elective and occasional, personal protection measures may be adequate to minimize
risk. However, in regions where tick infection rates are high and exposure is unavoidable, as in
many suburban environments in the northeastern United States, the use of insecticides is the only
effective means available to lower the risk of Lyme disease.
Ticks are susceptible to several chemical insecticides that are suitable for use in the environment
or on hosts. Application of an insecticide directly to a tick-infested area is the most common
method of control. However, because of the tick's life cycle of two or more years and the
redistribution of ticks between each host-feeding event, several applications of an insecticide
over a large area are necessary to suppress significantly tick populations of the I. persulcatus
complex [105]. Large area applications of DDT were successfully used to reduce morbidity from
tick-borne encephalitis in Siberia [106], but only insecticides with the persistence of DDT
provide long-term control. Although single insecticide applications reduced the abundance of
nymphal I. scapularis on high-risk residential properties in Westchester County and Lyme,
acceptance by the public and health agencies of such well-targeted insecticide use has been slow
because of environmental concerns [107]. Nevertheless, because of the prevalence of Lyme
disease in suburban areas of the Northeast, the benefit of reduced tick abundance through annual
insecticide application to lawns may outweigh potential environmental costs.
A novel approach to reduce the risk of Lyme disease through insecticides includes a self-delivery
system for mice [108]. Cotton, treated with permethrin insecticide and provided in paper tubes, is
used for nesting material by the white-footed mouse. The application system is designed to
render mice tick-free during the entire enzootic transmission season and, thus, prevent immature
I. scapularis from either transmitting or acquiring B. burgdorferi. Although this technique was
effective in one study in Massachusetts, it did not reduce risk measurably in three field tests in
Connecticut and New York [109]. The diversity of reservoir-competent host species that help to
maintain endemic foci of Lyme disease may limit the usefulness of any method that targets a
single reservoir species. An imaginative strategy, not yet evaluated in the field, to reduce the
prevalence of infected ticks and wildlife through vaccination of reservoir hosts against B.
burgdorferi may suffer from the same limitation [102]. A host-targeted insecticide applied to
deer may be more effective in reducing the incidence of Lyme disease [108]. Because of the
narrow host range of adult I. scapularis, topical applications of an insecticide to deer would limit
tick reproduction and eventually reduce the total tick population in the affected area. However,
identification of appropriate insecticides, provision of effective delivery systems, and better
knowledge of deer behavior in suburban environments are problems to be solved before a deer-
targeted strategy can be put into practice.
The potential for biological means of tick control through natural enemies is relatively
unexplored. Few natural predators or pathogens are known for ticks [110]. The obligatory blood-
feeding nature of ticks suggests that there may be limited opportunities for the acquisition of
pathogens or parasites directly from the environment. An insect parasite of I. scapularis has been
found in the Elizabeth Islands, Massachusetts [109], but its impact on risk has not been
determined. Laboratory colonies of the parasite appear to be easily established, and sustained
releases from colonized stock may ultimately help to reduce risk in isolated situations.
The total nutritional dependency of ticks on vertebrate hosts affords an opportunity to reduce the
abundance of Lyme disease vectors through limits in the availability of hosts. Such restriction
can be accomplished either directly by affecting host abundance or indirectly by making hosts
unavailable for tick feeding through topical application of repellents or insecticides or by
vaccination against ticks [108,111]. Again, deer would be the most suitable target. An attempt to
reduce the population of I. scapularis on a Massachusetts island by the removal of deer was only
successful when nearly all the deer were eliminated [24]. Thus, traditional deer management
practices alone are not likely to decrease significantly the risk of Lyme disease. Any alternative
to the elimination of deer would probably also have to approach 100% effectiveness. A
combination of host reduction, habitat modification, and area insecticide application was
successfully used in a control program for a pest tick, A. americanum [112], but the general
suitability of such integrated control techniques for Lyme disease prevention remains to be
determined.
Personal protection measures are the most frequent recommendation provided by public health
agencies to reduce the risk of Lyme disease [3]. These measures include the wearing of light-
colored clothing, taping the tops of socks over trouser cuffs, and the use of insect repellents on
clothing and exposed skin. Such recommendations are easy to make because they place
responsibility for prevention on the individual. However, personal protection measures may
actually have limited effectiveness in suburban areas with high tick density. Clearly, public
health agencies will have to take a more active role in prevention than providing simple cautions
if their efforts are to reduce the incidence of B. burgdorferi infection.
Conclusion
Ironically, the emergence of Lyme disease as a health problem is attributable in part to the
``greening'' of the United States: forests are regaining those lands formerly devoted to
agriculture. Citizens value ever more highly the propinquity of wildlife to their residences. Deer,
once close to elimination in many parts of the United States, are now as commonly noted as
squirrels in some suburban communities. A cost of this otherwise welcomed development is
Lyme disease. Living close to nature may have more public health consequences in the future as
other known zoonotic diseases expand their ranges, and as perhaps others are discovered [113].
The history of Lyme disease also shows that a newly recognized disease may be defined as much
by individuals and groups outside of academic and governmental institutions as by those within
them. Consequently, a mix of opinion has formed about what Lyme disease is and how it should
be managed.
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114. Supported by National Institutes of Health grants A129731, A124424 (A.G.B.), and A128956 (D.F.); Centers
for Disease Control Contract U50/CCU20662601 (D.F.); USDA grant 58-1265-2119 (D.F.); and grants from the
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Figure 1. Erythema migrans of the skin of patients at the Lyme Disease diagnostic Center,
Westchester County Medical Center, New York [Photograph courtesy of G.P. Wormser]
Figure 2. Human cases of lyme disease in the United States in 1990 by county. Counties with
two or more cases of Lyme disease by criteria of the Centers for Disease Control [83], Fort
Collins, Colorado.