Article

2009-10-10 Science & Technology

Virus linked to chronic fatigue syndrome

A study on chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) has linked the mysterious and controversial disease to a recently discovered retrovirus. Just last month researchers found the same virus to be associated with aggressive prostate tumours.

CFS is marked by debilitating exhaustion and often an array of other symptoms, including memory and concentration problems and painful muscles and joints. The underlying cause of the disease is unknown; it is diagnosed only when other physical and psychiatric diseases have been excluded. Though the disease's nebulous nature originally drew scepticism from both doctors and the general public, most of the medical community now perceives it as a serious -- if poorly defined -- disease.

Now Judy Mikovits of the Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease in Reno, Nevada, and her colleagues think they have discovered a potential pathogenic link to CFS. In patients with the disease from different parts of the United States, 67% were infected with a retrovirus known as XMRV. Less than 4% of controls carried the virus.

"I can't wait to be able to tell my patients," says Mikovits, who is also the vice president of drug development for Genyous Biomed in Henderson, Nevada. "It's going to knock their socks off. They've had such a stigma. People have just assumed they were just complainers who didn't handle stress well."

Posted by Fred 2009-10-10 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11135 views ] Top

#1 What next??
So anyone know if anything can be done about XMRV?

Can you be tested for it?

I used to have CFS very bad, but now I cope with it OK.

Posted by Bright Pebbles 2009-10-10 09:00|| 2009-10-10 09:00|| Front Page Top

#2 They develop an antidote and they're Scrooge McDuck rich.

Posted by Redneck Jim 2009-10-10 14:53|| 2009-10-10 14:53|| Front Page Top

#3 This gives a direction for research, Bright Pebbles. There are no treatments yet, just a test for antibodies.

On the other hand, the Eppstein-Barr virus was implicated in CFS back in the 1980s -- 70% of sufferers were found to be infected with it, only for the researchers to discover that 70% of non-suffering Americans also have antibodies to the virus. Recently it was discovered that the situation is more complex. There are three varients of the E-B antibody: the antibodies of those whose systems defeated the virus, and are therefore no longer infected; the antibodies of those experiencing an acute attack, commonly known as Mononucleosis, or the Kissing Disease; and, the antibodies of those experiencing a long-term, low grade infection which acts as a steady drain on one's energy, and thus a factor in CFS. There is currently no known cure for an E-B infection; all one can do if it goes chronic is to make sure to take vitamins and eat a balanced diet, avoid other infections as much as possible, and not overtax one's strength, lest the E-B flare up into acute Mono, the key symptom of which is acute fatigue.

Or at least that's my understanding of what I was told last autumn. I am not a member of the health-related professions.

Posted by trailing wife 2009-10-10 17:31|| 2009-10-10 17:31|| Front Page Top

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