24 cases of GBS in one area
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July 27, 2011 at 9:01 am
Interesting:
Rare Paralyzing Infection Sickens 24 on U.S.-Mexico Border
Published July 27, 2011 | ReutersA rare condition that can cause paralysis has sickened two dozen people in a small area straddling the Arizona-Mexico border, authorities said on Tuesday.
The Arizona Department of Health Services reported a cluster of 24 cases of the rare Guillain-Barre Syndrome in Yuma County in far western Arizona and neighboring San Luis Rio Colorado, in Mexico’s northern Sonora state.
The rare condition, which normally affects only one in 100,000 people, causes muscle weakness and a creeping numbness in the arms and legs, leading in some cases to paralysis, respiratory problems and even death.
“It’s very unusual … With 24 cases in a small geographic area, that was really concerning to us,” Joli Weiss, Arizona’s food and water borne epidemiologist, told Reuters.
Of the two dozen cases so far reported, 17 were diagnosed in Mexico, and seven in Arizona.
Weiss said Arizona health authorities were working closely with Mexican federal and state counterparts in Sonora to find the cause of the outbreak, which is usually linked to a bacterial infection in food or water.“We want to make sure that, if it is a water or food-borne contamination, that we are able to control that and prevent it from occurring in other people,” Weiss said.
“We are definitely looking at travel histories for these individuals, as well as what foods they have been (eating and if) they have they been to any large gatherings with any commonalities,” she said.
The Arizona health department said the joint investigation into the cluster of cases was the first involving travel across the border by U.S. and Mexican health officials.Health officials from Sonora have conducted outreach and education to residents in the San Luis Rio Colorado area. Arizona health officials have asked doctors and hospitals to watch for the signs of Guillain-Barre Syndrome and quickly contact their local health office with any possible cases.
Weiss said the condition is not passed from person to person. She recommended people living in or traveling to the region should wash their hands thoroughly after using the bathroom, as well as before cooking and eating.
“This sounds like it’s an underlying food-borne or water-borne illness, and those are pretty easily prevented just by taking some of these measures,” she said.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/07/27/rare-paralyzing-infection-sickens-24-on-us-mexico-border
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July 27, 2011 at 9:18 am
Wow, gotta keep tabs on this one. Sounds like they haven’t got a clue. Wash your hands to avoid getting GBS?
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July 27, 2011 at 4:03 pm
I was thinking the same thing….never heard in ALL the research I have done that GBS was a food or water borne disease??? Strange!!!:confused:
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July 27, 2011 at 9:31 pm
You are right this is a big deal that will hopefully bring some attention to GBS. Campylobacter jejuni is most likely the culprit, but 24 cases in the desert should raise some eyebrows. 24 people w GBS in a year is what would be expected in a city of 1.5M to have this happen in a couple weeks is a real concern.
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July 28, 2011 at 4:36 pm
I haven’t heard anything else in the news. Anybody else?
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August 3, 2011 at 1:20 pm
I am disturbed by the lack of response in the media to this story, surely this isn’t ‘normal’ or whatever that means with this damn disease. Has the debt-ceiling issue got people transfixed? If it’s a bacterial infection that’s causing it, then surely this needs to be resolved before another ‘outbreak’……here I am suggesting that I know a damn thing or anybody else for that matter, we’ve all read the same repeated assumptions and conclusions made by the medical community
it remains a syndrome
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August 3, 2011 at 6:04 pm
[QUOTE=GH-CIDP]The association of GBS with GI infections, and with [i]Campylobacter jejuni[/i] in particular, is not new. It is mentioned by Parry and Steinberg.[/QUOTE]
yeah, yeah, I read the same book -
August 4, 2011 at 1:29 pm
We have members on our forum who got GBS after severe food poisoning.
So here’s a question: how many people in Canada got GBS from severe food poisoning from the Maple Leaf foods tainted meat disaster? Where are the stats on that? There were deaths and severe illness affecting the neurological system. (GBS?) -
August 4, 2011 at 1:35 pm
[QUOTE=D.U.]We have members on our forum who got GBS after severe food poisoning.
So here’s a question: how many people in Canada got GBS from severe food poisoning from the Maple Leaf foods tainted meat disaster? Where are the stats on that? There were deaths and severe illness affecting the neurological system. (GBS?)[/QUOTE]
Hey DU, I hope you are well. The outbreak caused lysteria but there was no reported outbreak of GBS to my knowledge and I’m a news hound. Shouldn’t eat that stuff anyway it’s all arseholes and ears, I can’t call it ‘meat’ -
August 4, 2011 at 6:52 pm
Yes, I know it caused listeria, and deaths and severe illness.
And lawsuits. So the medical facts would be silenced, according to the terms of compensation. And the truth is silenced.
My point being that what we read in the media is flawed information, and the real facts are often undisclosed to the public.
We all know that the doctors and the media don’t go around looking for GBS cases to report. It is only by unusual dumb luck that a case even gets into the newspapers; the rest are kept out of public scrutiny. -
August 13, 2011 at 2:50 pm
[COLOR=”Magenta”]’nope, nothing to see here people, move along now'[/COLOR]
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August 14, 2011 at 11:30 am
I wonder if those folks on the Arizona/Mexico border were bitten by scorpions. I am reasonably sure that a scorpion bite I sustained in Mexico (different part, though), together with tons of aedes aegyptus bites, and a stomach virus, caused my CIDP. These events occurred right before the onset of my CIDP.
In fact I mentioned this to Dr. Burt as part of my stem cell evaluation and he was quite interested in the relationship.
Sharon
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August 14, 2011 at 12:44 pm
[QUOTE=Anastasia52]I wonder if those folks on the Arizona/Mexico border were bitten by scorpions. I am reasonably sure that a scorpion bite I sustained in Mexico (different part, though), together with tons of aedes aegyptus bites, and a stomach virus, caused my CIDP. These events occurred right before the onset of my CIDP.
In fact I mentioned this to Dr. Burt as part of my stem cell evaluation and he was quite interested in the relationship.
Sharon[/QUOTE]
Hey SharonAgreed, but unless these communities have been overrun with scorpions why this cluster?
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