Hi Richie,
This is the reinvention of the OSPA vaccine (originally called Lymerix) that was withdrawn from the US market.
New Lyme Vaccine
New company, new Euro clinical trials, yet using the same old formula that did not succeed in the US market and which it was claimed was causing RA in certain genetic haplotypes (HLA-DRB1*0401) – the same haplotype associated with RA, MS and chronic Lyme disease.
The story is documented here: The Lyme vaccine: a cautionary tale
The relationship of OSPA and chronic Lyme arthritis was written about by Dr. Steere, the rheumatologist who is credited with the discovery of Lyme in CT, causing a very large cluster of JRA, yet he denies any correlation with the OSPA vaccine causing chronic arthritis in mouse models, which isn’t wholly convincing without replicated human trials.
Relationship between Immunity to Borrelia burgdorferi Outer-surface Protein A (OspA) and Lyme Arthritis
Moral of the story, if considering this new vaccine, get informed and get genetic haplotype testing in advance, something the study authors above state was considered too expensive and one of the reasons for the vaccine’s failure. Also note that the OSPA protein of the Lyme bug that was used in the old vaccine was specific to the most prevalent strain that is found in the US, so I don’t understand why this new (old) vaccine is being tested in Europe in human clinical trials where other borrelial strains are more prevalent and when it could potentially be marketed again in the US.