Is Lyme disease Contagious?

Transmission of Lyme disease from Person to Person

Lyme disease is considered infectious but is not transmitted from person to person. Generally, a disease like this is caused by an infectious agent and not spread between people.
Lyme disease, although infectious, is not a genetic disease. It is not caused by a defective or abnormal gene.

Transmission of Lyme disease from Animals

The transmission of Lyme disease can be by way of:

• blood feeding insects and can include ticks and mosquitoes.
• insects.
• ticks.

Contagion summary:

Lyme disease bacteria are NOT transmitted from person-to-person. For example, you cannot get infected from touching or kissing a person who has Lyme disease, or from a health care worker who has treated someone with the disease, or by sexual contact. (Source: excerpt from Questions and Answers About Lyme Disease: DVBID)

About contagion and contagiousness:

Contagion and contagiousness refers to how easily the spread of Lyme disease is possible from one person to another. Other words for contagion include "infection", "infectiousness", "transmission" or "transmissability". Contagiousness has nothing to do with genetics or inheriting diseases from parents. For an overview of contagion, see Introduction to Contagion.

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