A new peer‑reviewed paper is sounding the alarm about a long‑overlooked risk: the possibility that Lyme disease can be transmitted from an infected mother to her unborn child.

The study, published in Frontiers in Medicine and announced by the Bay Area Lyme Foundation, argues that the evidence is compelling and the stakes too high for the issue to be ignored.

Researchers point to decades of case reports, observational studies, and federal acknowledgments from both the CDC and NIH that mother‑to‑child transmission of Borrelia burgdorferi is possible.

With an estimated 500,000 Americans diagnosed with Lyme disease each year, the authors warn that the potential impact on pregnancy and infant health is a major public health issue that has received far too little attention.

Huge gap in resesarch

Dr. Charlotte Mao, an infectious disease pediatrician and co‑author of the paper, said the gap in research is striking.

“I have seen firsthand the impact of Lyme disease in children and have suspected that the infection may have been passed from mother to child during pregnancy in a number of my patients,” she said. “The first case studies were observed in the 1980s, yet decades later, we still lack sufficient research and clear, evidence‑based guidance.”

The authors argue that the science has reached a tipping point: enough signals exist to justify major investment in real‑world studies. They call for large, prospective research following pregnant individuals with Lyme disease, long‑term tracking of their children, and coordinated biorepositories to collect samples from mothers, placentas, and infants.

Dr. Monica Embers, the study’s lead author and a professor at the Tulane National Biomedical Research Center, said the scientific community has been frustrated by the lack of progress.

“Despite decades of scientific observations indicating that maternal Lyme Borrelia infection can induce disease in offspring, a lack of real‑world data to guide physicians and families remains,” she said. She added that limited funding has slowed efforts to understand the risks.

Risks are too important to overlook

The publication grew out of a scientific meeting at the Banbury Center at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where an international group of researchers, clinicians, and public health experts reviewed decades of evidence. The meeting was funded by the Steven & Alexandra Cohen Foundation, a major supporter of Lyme disease research and one of the largest private funders of tick‑borne disease science in the United States.

The group examined case reports, animal studies, epidemiological data, and surveys of pregnant individuals with and without Lyme disease. They found that adverse outcomes — including miscarriage, stillbirth, and congenital infection — have been documented, though the true frequency remains unknown.

Participants stressed that the next phase of research must determine how often transmission occurs, how it happens, and what long‑term health effects may emerge in children.

SOURCE: Bay Area Lyme Foundation