Jenna’s Lyme Blog

In 2009, “Science Magazine” published a newly released paper from Whittemore Peterson Institute about the existence of XMRV, (which stands for xenotropic murine leukemia virus related virus,) which looked to be a causative agent in CFS, Fibromyalgia, Prostate Cancer and several other neuro-immune disorders.

The race was on.

All around the world there were doors opened for research scientists to apply this remarkable discovery and try to find better diagnostic tools, better treatment and of course – the great career maker – finding a cure.

Somehow, I am willing to bet that the excitement surrounding the original research had more to do with the potential impact on prostate cancer patients.

Why?

Well, if you aren’t familiar with “Osler’s Web: Inside The Labyrinth of the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Epidemic”, then perhaps you are unaware of the government scandal that was exposed by author Hillary Johnson in 1996 proving fraud to the tune of many millions of dollars that had been earmarked from Congress to the CDC to research CFS/ME, but had been applied to other programs.  This involved cooked books and lying to Congress amongst many other crimes by an entire division at CDC.

Thankfully those funds have been accounted for and new programs put together under new management at the CDC.

So, up until the announcement last year by WPI, there had been very few breakthroughs regarding cause or cure, and the XMRV discovery gave the estimated 17  millions of sufferers hope for the first time in many years.

Now, a year later, the mud slinging has begun with small studies that seem designed to do nothing more than cast doubt on the original work at WPI.  With the close connections that have been drawn between CFS/ME, Fibromyalgia, RA, MS, Autism, chronic Lyme disease (Oooh, yes we have been told by the dark robed priests of the IDSA that there is no such thing as chronic Lyme disease!) by top researchers who have been written about elsewhere in this blog, one must question the validity of the mud-slingers, and wonder if continued funding will allow WPI and other reputable research firms to solve the mystery of XMRV – amazingly only the third type of virus known to mankind at this time.

So little is known just yet, but enough for some medical doctors who are themselves infected with chronic Lyme to consider jumping ship altogether and dividing Lyme sufferers into those who respond to antibiotics – those without XMRV, and those who don’t respond to antibiotics, don’t have Lyme and have XMRV instead which would explain quite a bit about the vast differences between treatment responses.

One such doctor is Jamie Deckoff-Jones, MD who tells her story convincingly at http://treatingxmrv.blogspot.com/2010/05/thoughts-about-chronic-lyme-disease.html

It has been so exciting to think that perhaps XMRV would give chronic Lyme, CFS/ME, Fibromyalgia and other chronic illnesses some hope for future help.  But it appears that the baby may be getting thrown out with the bath water.

Similar Posts:

• Discovery of New Retrovirus XMRV Brings Hope to Millions of Sufferers.
• News From Dr. Brian Fallon at Columbia University’s Lyme Clinic
• URGENT NEWS: HGRV (XMRV) Likely Involved With Chronic Lyme Disease
• Don’t Give Up Hope.
• Major Newspaper Reports On Chronic Lyme Disease.
• Bee Venom to Cure Chronic Lyme Disease?
• New Chronic Lyme Disease Study
• Colostrum for Chronic Lyme Disease
• Why Can’t We Recover From Lyme Disease?
• A Miracle: Building More Killer Cells For Chronic Lyme Disease

Posted on May 20th, 2010 under Chronic Lyme Disease, Neurological Lyme disease, Personal stories, Research and Development • Tags: CFS/ME, Chronic Lyme disease, Fibromyalgia, XMRV. • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback