I live in the US, and I had Lyme when I was a teenager. Simple blood test confirmed it, I was prescribed antibiotics and it cleared up nearly instantly. No one told me it didn't exist.

Fun fact: The disease is named for Lyme, Connecticut, USA. That's where it was first identified as a unique condition.

It's common enough in the northeast and north-central US that my public schools taught everyone basic prevention and symptoms as part of the regular curriculum.

Do you have an article about the case you're talking about?

There is a difference between Lyme disease and chronic Lyme disease. My guess is that this case has something to do with that difference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyme_disease

Lyme disease, also known as Lyme borreliosis, is a tick-borne disease caused by species of Borrelia bacteria, transmitted by blood-feeding ticks in the genus Ixodes.[4][9][10] It is the most common disease spread by ticks in the Northern Hemisphere.[11][8] Infections are most common in the spring and early summer.[4] Infection is treatable with antibiotics. Most treated patients experience a full recovery. For some patients recovery may not be immediate or complete, resulting in long-term effects.[12] Early detection and prompt treatment are associated with more favorable outcomes.[13]

Diagnosis is based on a combination of symptoms, history of tick exposure, and possibly testing for specific antibodies in the blood

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronic_Lyme_disease

Despite numerous studies, there is no evidence that symptoms associated with CLD are caused by any persistent infection.[4] The symptoms attributed to chronic Lyme are in many cases likely due to fibromyalgia or chronic fatigue syndrome.[5][6] Fibromyalgia can be triggered by an infection, and antibiotics are not a safe or effective treatment for post-infectious fibromyalgia.[7] Fatigue, joint and muscle pain are also experienced by a minority of people following antibiotic treatment for Lyme disease.[3]

A number of alternative health products are promoted for chronic Lyme disease,[8] of which possibly the most controversial and harmful is long-term antibiotic therapy, particularly intravenous antibiotics.[9][10] Recognised authorities advise against long-term antibiotic treatment for Lyme disease, even where some symptoms persist post-treatment.[11][12][13]

In the United States, after disciplinary proceedings by state medical licensing boards, a subculture of "Lyme literate" physicians has successfully lobbied for specific legal protections, exempting them from the standard of care and science-based treatment guidelines. Such legislation has been criticised as an example of "legislative alchemy", the process whereby pseudomedicine is legislated into practice.[14][15][16] Some doctors view the promotion of chronic Lyme disease as an example of health fraud.[17]

Chronic Lyme disease is distinct from untreated late-stage Lyme disease, which can cause arthritis, peripheral neuropathy and/or encephalomyelitis. Chronic Lyme disease is also distinct from post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome (PTLDS) when symptoms linger after standard antibiotic treatments.[18][19] PTLDS is estimated to occur in less than 5% of people who had Lyme disease and were treated.[20] In contrast to these recognized medical conditions, the promotion of chronic Lyme disease has been accused of being health fraud.[17] In many cases there is no objective evidence that people who believe they have chronic Lyme have ever been infected with Lyme disease: standard diagnostic tests for infection are often negative.[2][21]

Yes, it's recognized in the US. Not always quickly and accurately, I've known several people who lived with it for years before a doctor finally figured it out.

(Pure personal anecdotal, not data-backed) I suspect a generation of doctors were trained only to look for a red rash in the shape of a bullseye target on the patient's skin and not to run blood tests until a bullseye is seen. People with Lyme don't always get the bullseye rash or sometimes it's in an area not easy to detect it (on scalp, covered in hair). Hopefully there continues to be better awareness and diagnostics.

It's not super common where I live (middle of the US). I've been bitten by ticks many times but never contracted Lyme. My state advises saving the tick for 30 days after it bites you. If you have any symptoms, your doctor's office can arrange to have it tested. If it tests positive, you get tested and then treated if needed and also the an official report goes to the Center for Disease Control (CDC), which is a national-level public health agency.

Unfortunately, the CDC is under the Department of Health and Human Services, which is now run by RFK Jr. I wouldn't be surprised if that moron were to advise tanning one's butthole as treatment for Lyme.

I watched the news segment linked in here and I'm neither a doctor, nor a healthcare administrator, nor an Aussie: this does sound rather daft. You could contract the disease while being abroad even if all Aussie ticks were proven to be clean. Which is at least in doubt based on two local cases they interviewed. I'm guessing this is a very small number of people getting royally screwed by the system.

On a semi-serious note, would the Australian healthcare system also refuse to treat a person with Ebola based on the fact that the virus is known to be of African origin?

My dad got lyme's disease when I was a kid. Mother diagnosed it using our girl scout handbook. It was taken care of by doctors after that so I'm guessing they agreed?