Meeting today with Member of Parliament, Kyle Seeback

Posting after a full month of hiatus from the blog, dealing with a heap of extra work, overtime, trying to learn new stuff, and working on a new international project. Thank you if you still stopped by the blog despite a lack of updates.

Today's heat wilted us again, added tornado warnings for an area around us, and had everyone seeking the coolness of air conditioning. I've got pictures taken inside the car, with temps registering 39 C (Monday) and 44 C (Tuesday). All our igloos have melted .... But we are promised relief in the next few days.

We had another form of relief as well, during a meeting this morning in Brampton, Ontario. I'm not at liberty to give all the details yet, but there will be follow-up very soon, and I believe that promise!

Thanks to City Councillor John Sanderson, who arranged for a meeting with MP Kyle Seeback, five of us met today to discuss the problems around Lyme Disease, lack of doctors to treat, patients being set adrift and not enough warnings put out for the general public. The bottom line is still that early diagnosis and treatment usually help to control the disease. If allowed to spread, the cost on all levels can be debilitating.

John Sanderson, me, Kyle Seeback, Rossana, and Kim

Mr. Seeback was very supportive. He knew a little about the plight of Lyme patients, but was suitably shocked and upset about the fact that we are not able to get treatment in Canada, that doctors are sent "on vacation" and that we have to seek help elsewhere. He agreed that we have to get the Federal government on board. He was also aware of the Private Member's Bill being brought forward by Elizabeth May to ask for a National Lyme Disease Strategy.

Rossana, who lost her husband to Lyme Disease and has been an outspoken advocate for years, talked about the new foundation she founded in his name and about what is being planned there. The hope is that the research facility will be open in 2015. [ If you missed that post, here is more, under the heading "New Foundation for Vector-Borne Diseases".]

Kim and I have both been sick with Lyme Disease for years, visited many doctors and specialists in Canada and found no help or correct diagnosis. Eventually we both had to seek treatment in the USA, pay out of pocket, spent years in treatment and still have to deal with the devastating results of the disease running rampant in our bodies for years before that. We are both now in remission. Rossana, Kim and I all and receive emails every week from people who are newly infected with nowhere to turn.

This will stop. But it might take Superman to help us!

Young Evan in his Superman shirt, admiring the Lyme Mobile

BREAKFAST AT APPLEBEE'S on SATURDAY
If you are in the area near the west end of Toronto, Mississauga, Etobicoke, Brampton, Caledon (Counties of Peel, Caledon and Halton Hills), please let me know if you still want a ticket for breakfast at Applebee's on Saturday morning! We have the place to ourselves between 8 am and 10 am. A ticket will buy you a short stack of pancakes with trimmings, bacon, coffee, tea or juice. For each ticket sold, 70% will be donated to the cause of Lyme Disease awareness. Email me through the Contact button above; there are still some tickets available.