The mission of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is to enhance the health and well-being of all Americans, by providing for effective health and human services and by fostering sound, sustained advances in the sciences underlying medicine, public health, and social services.
This section will contain all the articles from the various agencies that fall under HHS that the Lyme Disease Association, Inc. (LDA) has compiled about Lyme and other tick-borne diseases.
Health and Human Services Department (HHS) Chief Data Scientist and Senior Advisor to the Assistant Secretary for Health, Kristen Honey, recently gave an interview on HHS’s Lyme Innovation initiative with Nextgov.
As part of the LymeX public-private partnership between Health & Human Services (HHS) and the Cohen Foundation, HHS has published an RFI in the Federal Register, 2.11.21 that seeks information on the current state of the science and technology to accelerate “innovative solutions” for Lyme disease diagnosis. The RFI contains a series of questions it […]
The Tick-Borne Disease Working Group (TBDWG) was established by the 21st Century Cures Act to improve federal coordination of efforts related to tick-borne diseases. The TBDWG’s purpose is to review federal activities and research related to all tick-borne diseases and provide a summary of its findings and any recommendations regarding changes or improvements to such findings to the HHS Secretary and Congress every two years.
The Tick-Borne Disease Working Group 2020 Report to Congress is now available (Report). The Report was presented to the Secretary of Health & Human Services in December 2020 by the Working Group (WG). The Secretary sent the Report to the Energy & Commerce Committee in the House of Representatives and the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions […]
On her last day as an HHS Working Group (WG) member, after serving 2 terms, Lyme Disease Association President Pat Smith addressed at the Dec. 2 online WG meeting, her concerns about the procedures of the 2019-2020 Working Group and her concern that the interests of patients were not served by the group. Read below […]
BACKGROUND: The 17th Working Group Meeting turned out to be a referendum on the Patient Chapter of the upcoming 2020 Working Group report. The previous 9 months of the WG had seen that chapter content consistently eroded by comments from just a few WG members which forced shortening of chapter, removal of material, rewriting of […]
The 16th meeting of the Federal Tick-Borne Disease Working Group (WG) took place 10.27.20. Public commenters urged the WG to acknowledge and act on the changes needed for patient relief. In review of report chapters, contentious arguments continued, with Pat Smith again advocating passionately on behalf of chronic Lyme patients. (Below items are not in […]
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Steven & Alexandra Cohen Foundation announced a
new $25 million-dollar, public-private partnership – the LymeX Innovation Accelerator (LymeX).
The HHS website states, “Our LymeX mission is to strategically advance Lyme and tickborne disease solutions in direct collaboration with Lyme patients, patient advocates, and diverse stakeholders across academia, nonprofits, industry, and government.”
The recent 2-day virtual meeting of the Federal Tick-Borne Disease Working Group (WG) on Day 1 was more subdued than prior meetings , but Day 2 again brought forth an effort to minimize the patient access to care chapter and chronic Lyme. Day 1 September 15, 2020 Patients and patient advocates delivered verbal comments, including […]
The upcoming meeting of the HHS Working Group on Sept. 15 may be your last chance to influence language on persistent/chronic Lyme. At the last meeting, several members of the Working Group (WG) worked hard to have language related to patients with persistent Lyme symptoms removed from the WG report which will go to Congress at end of year.