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by Tim Swartz
A mysterious skin disease is currently spreading across the United States, but many doctors are not sure if it is real or is it just in the heads of the sufferers. It is called Morgellons and the symptoms sound as if they could have been lifted straight from the pages of a science fiction book.
Those with this disease describe feelings insects scuttling beneath their skin and have mysterious sores that ooze out blue and white fibers, some as thick as spaghetti strands. Attempts to remove the fibers are said to elicit shooting pains radiating from the site. The lesions range from minor to disfiguring in appearance and the fibers appear either as single strands or in bundles. Patients also sometimes report the presence of fibers or black granular specks on their skin even in the absence of lesions.
According to a news report from KTVU in Oakland, CA, Former Oakland A’s pitcher Billy Koch has the disease, as does his wife and three children. Koch had to leave baseball at the age of 29 partly because of the uncontrollable muscle twitching that went on for months at a time and kept up him up all night, another symptom of the disease.
The couple was at their wit’s end after numerous doctors not only provided little in the way of relief, but actually were skeptical about their health problems. The Kochs may be the most recognizable of more than 3,000 families nationwide who are now reporting these same unexplained symptoms. However, there are curious clusters of those suffering from the disease in Florida along the Gulf Coast, Texas, and in California’s San Francisco Bay Area.
To date, no clinical studies have looked into Morgellons and the first paper mentioning Morgellons was published in a recent issue of the American Journal of Clinical Dermatology, co-authored by members of the Morgellons Research Foundation, a non-profit organization devoted to raising public awareness about the disease.
The disease is named after a medical condition described in 1674 by British author Thomas Browne, who said that the disorder caused children to “break out with harsh hairs on their backs.” However, the Morgellons Research Foundation says that it is doubtful that the 17th-century disease is related to modern-day Morgellons.
Analysis of the fibers found in the sores suggest that they are more than just fabric lint, nor are the black specks composed of pepper, as several dermatologists have proposed. Some researchers say that the fibers are made of cellulose, a molecule generally found in plants. And strangely, if placed in a petri dish, the fibers taken from a Margellons sore will continue to grow.
Surprisingly, most of the medical community seems to think that Morgellons is mass delusion and most people complaining of the symptoms are diagnosed with “delusional parasitosis,” a psychological problem in which people imagine that they are infested with parasites. Yet patients a continent apart have reported the same symptoms long before hearing about the disease in the media or talking to other patients with similar symptoms, which suggests that the disease is not “just in one’s head.”
A Connection to Lyme Disease
The Morgellons Foundation says there are about 1,200 sufferers registered on their site. However, as they only registered the people who have a computer and happened to find them online, the foundation fears the real number of people infected with this mystery disease is much higher.
Evidence is also beginning to mount linking Morgellons to Lyme disease. Dr. Jennifer Choate, a hematologist who has been treating patients with Morgellons, says that many people who complain of the symptoms test positive for Lyme disease so it is possible that Morgellons is a similar infection that travels with the Lyme disease organism, transmitted via the bite of an infected deer tick.
As well, a study conducted under the auspices of the National Pediculosis Association in Needham, MA, and the Oklahoma State Department of Health, found that skin scrapings of ninety percent of Morgellons sufferers were found to have Collembola, also known as Springtails, an almost microscopic insect that feeds on algae, fungi, bacteria, and decaying matter.
What is unusual is that Collembola was not previously known to infest humans. Collembola predominately dwell in soil and litter and sometimes congregate under leaky sinks, swimming pools, or in potted plants. Little is known about the health effects of Collembola, or how to prevent or treat them when they infest human skin. However, the new findings bolster the contention of many Morgellons patients that there actually is an insect crawling under their skin.
Health experts say that while there is no cure for Morgellons, skin conditions almost always improve once patients begin taking antibiotics.
Victims of Morgellons are now faced with an uphill battle. They hope that a cure can be found, but probably the most difficult task is convincing doctors that their disease is real and not the symptom of a mental illness. Hopefully, new research will help uncover the facts about this baffling disease.
from issue #14 |
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