Sporting estates backing Lyme disease campaign

HEALTH: Grouse moor managers join fight against tickborne infections

Gamekeepers and grouse moor managers are backing an Angus campaigner’s drive for a change in health policy to help fight tick-borne infections and limit the spread of Lyme disease.

Lorraine Murray, from Montrose, founded the Tick-Borne Illness Campaign Scotland to press for better treatment for Lyme disease and related infections after the former army physical training instructor contracted the disease when she was bitten by a tick while walking her dog in 2014.

Next month the Scottish Parliament’s petitions committee will consider the call for better testing and treatment for Lyme disease and associated tick-borne infection by ensuring that medical professionals in Scotland are fully equipped to deal with them.

Earlier this year Ms Murray travelled to the US in her costly fight to regain health after being left virtually bedbound for 18 months by the debilitating condition.

Careful management of deer and hare numbers on Scottish grouse moors is being seen as an important strand in the control of tick numbers and the spread of disease.

Carrieanne Conaghan, coordinator of the Speyside Moorland Group, said: “It is important to carry out tick control – which includes sheep dipping and bracken spraying – as part of our wider moorland management practice.

“Moorland groups around Scotland fully support this petition as anyone who contracts Lyme disease can be severely affected.”

Picture: Mhairi Edwards. Lorraine Murray with the medication she needs.