KTVU Anchor: Doctor Chris Schade, founder and CEO of Quicksilver Scientific, to talk about the illness and the road to recovery. What exactly is Lyme disease?

Chris Shade, PhD: Lyme disease, classically, is an infection with a bacteria called Borrelia burgdorferi. It’s a spiraling bacteria that can work its way into your body, into your joints. It can cause a whole bunch of different symptoms.

There’s joint pain. There’s severe fatigue as it breaks down mitochondria. It can get into the brain and cause what’s called neuroinflammation, can have a lot of neuropsychiatric effects. And it’s very debilitating on the body. When you get bit by a tick, there’s not just Borrelia. There’s what’s called the three Bs. You can also get Barbesia and Bartonella. All of these have slightly different symptoms.

You may have all three of them at once, or you may have one. And there’s multiple different species of each. It can be very difficult to test for. And even 20 years ago you could lose your license if you treated this. It’s only recently that we really know that this is an actual thing that we can pin down and we can treat, but it’s very difficult to treat, and it’s crippling on the body sometimes.

09/03/2025 – KTVU San Francisco – https://youtu.be/XgG5nPT–AI