Sludge Watch ==> CDC now investigation Morgellons Disease

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

Morgellons.  Some say it may be sewage borne.
That might be why is is higher in LA and San Francisco...where sewage ends 
up in the ocean and the beach from sewage treatment plant spills.

Go to the webpage..that way you can look at the pictures.  There are some 
very interesting pictures of the fibers and the gooey plasma associated with 
the condition on the web.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_D_disease10.3488f52.html
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Skin-sore sufferers cast off as delusional

MORGELLONS: Only now is the U.S. studying it. Inland patients say it's a 
real, unrelenting disease.


10:08 PM PST on Thursday, November 9, 2006

By JANET ZIMMERMAN
The Press-Enterprise


Federal investigators are launching research in Southern California 
following congressional inquiries and hundreds of frantic calls from people 
complaining of a mysterious skin ailment that leaves them with open sores 
oozing fibers and black flecks.

Many believe they have Morgellons, an affliction that as yet lacks a 
scientific definition and is largely unrecognized by the medical community.

Related
Morgellons.org

Besides the lesions, sufferers say they have crawling, biting sensations 
that feel like bugs under their skin, debilitating fatigue and neurological 
problems, including memory loss and confusion. Most have bounced from doctor 
to doctor and been dismissed as delusional.

"This thing almost makes you want to go crazy because it doesn't go away," 
said Nina Peralta, 44, a clerk with the city of Rancho Cucamonga whose 
problems started two years ago with itchy, pimple-like bumps on her lower 
back. "And when you think you see some improvement, it comes out somewhere 
else on your body."

The investigation by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been 
delayed until early next year while a 12-member task force assembles a plan, 
including a formal definition of Morgellons and guidelines for how fibers 
will be collected, CDC spokesman Dan Rutz said. The scientists hope to 
determine whether it is contagious and if patients are linked by a common 
exposure, he said.

The research team includes a pathologist, toxicologist and specialists in 
infectious, parasitic, environmental and chronic diseases. A mental health 
expert also will be included, because most of the limited medical literature 
on Morgellons chalks it up to delusions of parasitosis, a mental illness in 
which sufferers believe they are infested with living organisms, Rutz said.




"We want to find out if the mental anguish is creating the physical symptoms 
or did the physical symptoms come first and the fact that they're unrelieved 
cause mental distress?" Rutz said.

Between 50 and 200 patients will be referred from dermatologists around Los 
Angeles, chosen because of a concentrated number of cases in the county, 
Rutz said. The research team will work out of a Veterans Administration 
hospital in Los Angeles.

The CDC announced its involvement in June after "a critical mass" of public 
complaints and questions from about a dozen members of Congress, he said.

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein's office forwarded letters from constituents and 
wanted to know what CDC was doing about the problem, said the California 
senator's spokesman, Scott Gerber.

So far, what's known about Morgellons comes from the Internet, where many 
people turned for support after doctors couldn't help, Rutz said.

"We frankly don't know much about this. This is a field that's been 
dominated by laypersons and activists, so there isn't much scientific data 
for us to go on. That's why CDC is taking an interest, for a scientific 
basis and to get beyond the speculation," Rutz said.

Mysterious Fibers

Questions about Morgellons outnumber answers, said Randy Wymore, a 
microbiologist at Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences, the 
only researcher to study the ailment.

Wymore and a physician have studied 30 patients from various states and 
collected hundreds of the fibers -- no longer than an eyebrow hair -- from 
Morgellons patients across the nation.

After comparing the fibers to strands from every piece of carpet, drapes and 
clothing he and his graduate students could find over a nine-month period, 
Wymore said he is convinced Morgellons is a real physical disease.

The threads don't match the 900 fibers or 100,000 organic compounds in the 
database used by Tulsa police, he said. And Morgellons symptoms don't 
correspond to those caused by known bacteria, fungus, viruses, parasites or 
worms, he said.


Paul Alvarez / The Press Enterprise
Nina Peralta shows sores from Morgellons, a mysterious skin ailment that 
gives the sufferer the feeling of creeping bugs.



"It's an absolute mystery," said Wymore, who receives up to 70 calls and 
e-mails a day from patients and doctors wanting to know more about 
Morgellons.

Many of the patients are "a bit eccentric," which may be tied to the 
disease's progression on the central nervous system, Wymore said.

Nothing Helps Rash

For sufferers like Peralta, Morgellons is very real.

Within a year, her rash-like bumps spread to her stomach, chest, arms, hands 
and neck. Peralta's family doctor and two dermatologists diagnosed scabies, 
eczema and dermatitis, but none of the prescribed creams, pills or steroid 
shots worked, she said.

In the middle of her sores is a dark spot, like a grain of sand, Peralta 
said. And in the past six months, they've contained a curly white fiber -- 
like that from a Q-tip -- which she coaxes out with her fingernails.

Doctors tried to blame her case on stress and depression from the death of 
her husband in a car accident five years ago, Peralta said. She gave up on 
doctors in March after one prescribed anti-anxiety medication, which she 
refused to take.

The emotional toll has been devastating, she said.

For about six months, before she realized no one around her was getting the 
sores, Peralta wouldn't hug her 12-year-old son for fear of spreading the 
condition to him. Some of her co-workers refuse to sit at her desk, Peralta 
said, and on the street, people stare if she doesn't cover her sores and the 
scars they left behind on her once-pristine skin.

"This thing has consumed my life," said Peralta, who lives in Upland.

Disease in Dispute

Self-reported cases of Morgellons have shown up in all 50 states and other 
countries, but the largest concentrations are in California, Texas and 
Florida, according to the Morgellons Research Foundation.

Mary Leitao founded the group after her 2-year-old son developed a lesion on 
his lip in 2001. A magnified look at the sore by Leitao, a biologist, showed 
bundles of red and blue fibers.

She found reference to Morgellons in a 17th century medical study describing 
an illness that caused similar symptoms in French children. Leitao adopted 
the name and posted her findings on a Web site, Morgellons.org.

The site has logged nearly 7,600 registrations of families with similar 
stories, including Peralta and about 80 others in Riverside and San 
Bernardino counties who have registered since May. The registrations are 
funneled to Oklahoma State University's Wymore, who said actual numbers are 
probably much higher because the tally is limited to those seeking help on 
the Internet.

Many doctors refuse to call Morgellons a disease, dismissing the sores as 
self-inflicted and chalking the fibers up to common threads from clothes and 
furnishings.

"There is reasonably little evidence there is an organism causing these 
symptoms people describe," said Dr. Eric Frykman, San Bernardino County's 
health officer. "As far as I'm concerned, this hasn't risen to the level 
where this needs to be investigated locally as a public health concern."

J. Anne Gleason, 66, of Victorville, traced the beginning of her Morgellons 
to March 2005, when lesions as large as a half dollar appeared on her back, 
ankles, wrists and stomach. Inside were white, red and bluish-green threads, 
black specks and crystals that hurt when she pulled them out with tweezers, 
she said.

"They just kept coming and coming. It drove me nuts," she said.

Stinging, Crawling

Gleason said she took prescribed antibiotics and follows doctors' advice to 
bathe in bleach and vinegar baths and use a surgical scrub.

She disinfects her house and washes her clothes and bedding in bleach but 
has found relief only with Caladryl lotion, she said.

The worst part, she said, is the feeling that bugs are scuttling beneath her 
skin.

"It's this stinging and crawling on your body, so bad it will wake you up at 
night," Gleason said.

"The doctors don't know what it is, so they want to believe it is 
psychosis."

Reach Janet Zimmerman at 951-368-9586 or jzimmerman at PE.com