What is Lyme disease in human?

Symptoms that almost certainly represent cases of Lyme disease were described in the European medical literature in the late nineteenth century.

A resident of Lyme, Connecticut, named Polly Murray, who is credited with original detective work that alerted biomedical experts that anew disease might exist, probably suffered from Lyme disease as early as the 1950s.

The discoveries that led to the contemporary view of this infectious disease occurred in 1982, when Willy Burgdorfer and his colleagues identified what turned out to be a new Borrelia species from Ixodes ticks collected on eastern Long Island.

Lyme disease is a bacterial infection caused by Borrelia Burgdorferi, and elongated, spiral-shaped bacteria transmitted to humans through the bite of a tick.

Known as spirochetes, these bacteria are unusual, not well studied, elusive and difficult to cultivate in the laboratory, and capable of advanced survival activities more commonly found in larger, more intelligent organisms.

The ailment, which affects adults and children alike, is widespread in the northern hemisphere and continues to expand as humans encroach in the sylvatic habitat of the spirochete’s mammalian reservoirs.

Early symptoms of the disease in humans include muscle aches, low-grade fever, and lethargy; these are followed later by arthritis and damage to the heart and nervous system.
What is Lyme disease in human?