Bb isolated from dogs after 30 days high-dose abx

[Guest guest]

This is a paper I hadnt seen. Leave it to the vets of Cornell to point

out reality to the MDs... good thing weve got a crack team of BSers to

deftly brush it under the rug.

The doxy-group dogs took 20 mg/kg/d, which is like me sucking down

1200 mg of doxy per day (however, dogs may excrete it faster or

something... I dont know... but the investigators did measure the

plasma drug levels, by bioassay, to make sure they were sufficient).

One of six doxy-treated dogs, kept in isolation, developed symptomatic

arthritis despite the 30-day treatment! And remained culture+ and PCR+.

This pisses me right off!

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J Clin Microbiol. 1997 Jan;35(1):111-6.

Persistence of Borrelia burgdorferi in experimentally infected

dogs after antibiotic treatment.

Straubinger RK, Summers BA, Chang YF, Appel MJ.

A. Baker Institute for Animal Health, College of Veterinary

Medicine, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA.

rks4@...

In specific-pathogen-free dogs experimentally infected with

Borrelia burgdorferi by tick exposure, treatment with high doses of

amoxicillin or doxycycline for 30 days diminished but failed to

eliminate persistent infection. Although joint disease was prevented

or cured in five of five amoxicillin- and five of six

doxycycline-treated dogs, skin punch biopsies and multiple tissues

from necropsy samples remained PCR positive and B. burgdorferi was

isolated from one amoxicillin- and two doxycycline-treated dogs

following antibiotic treatment. In contrast, B. burgdorferi was

isolated from six of six untreated infected control dogs and joint

lesions were found in four of these six dogs. Serum antibody levels to

B. burgdorferi in all dogs declined after antibiotic treatment.

Negative antibody levels were reached in four of six doxycycline- and

four of six amoxicillin-treated dogs. However, in dogs that were kept

in isolation for 6 months after antibiotic treatment was discontinued,

antibody levels began to rise again, presumably in response to

proliferation of the surviving pool of spirochetes. Antibody levels in

untreated infected control dogs remained high.

PMID: 8968890