Lyme disease via Shutterstock
As both tempers and cases of Lyme disease flare in Massachusetts, lawmakers in the statehouse have yet to decide on a new Lyme disease bill that proposes to extend health care coverage to any length deemed necessary by a doctor.
But even as record numbers of Lyme disease cases arise in the Commonwealth, the main question that's emerging is whether this bill will ever be passed. Deadlines have come and gone, the most recent being March 16. And going forward it is uncertain what the amended timetable is for taking up the legislation.
Massachusetts declared Lyme disease a public health crisis last year, as the state's Department of Public Health reported 5,304 cases in 2014, the second-most of all states. But because the majority of Lyme disease cases have historically gone unreported, the department admits that last year’s total cases could really approach 50,000.
Current Massachusetts law requires insurance companies to cover the costs of just four weeks' worth of antibiotics treatments. This makes sense on the surface, since according to the Centers for Disease Control most Lyme disease patients only need this amount of time to fully recover from their symptoms.
But what about others who claim to suffer from chronic Lyme disease?
These sufferers say they experience debilitating pain and fatigue that last well past a four-week period. They say they can't afford to pay for such extra treatment themselves, and have seen their lives severely impacted as a result.
“We’ve got people remortgaging their homes. They’re too sick to work,” said Trish McCleary, an advocate for Lyme disease patients, and a former member of the Massachusetts Lyme Commission, speaking with the Boston Herald. If passed, McCleary, 50, says the current bill would both save lives, and for those previously incapacitated “put people back to work.”
Many share McCleary's sentiments on the bill, and about 70 percent of all Massachusetts legislators have cosponsored it. But those opposed to the bill claim that it’s not backed up by medical research.
Medical experts have yet to acknowledge that chronic Lyme disease even exists. Still, the state Center for Health Information and Analysis reported last year that as many as 20 percent of all Lyme disease patients stay sick long after the required four-week treatment period – often months or even years later. Opponents of the bill also say that the cost of such increased healthcare coverage would put too much of a financial burden on employers and consumers, through increases in monthly health insurance premiums.
Yet the Center for Health Information and Analysis reports that the bill would cost practically nothing to enact, and that premiums would rise no more than 13 cents. What's more, just last week the state's joint committee on financial services, comprised of many cosponsors, gave the new bill a green light.
"Advocates are being given no explanation despite an outpouring of pleas to legislators," McCleary wrote prior to last week's missed deadline in an open letter on Telegram.com. "Where do families go when medications are not accessible in the midst of a clear and present epidemic?"