Post Ebola Syndrome or ME/CFS?

[Cort]

A doctor who'd apparently recovered from Ebola. He showed up in the hospital with severe eye problems and ....fatigue, joint and muscle pain and hearing loss. Other survivors report headaches. The eye problems were due to Ebola - but what about the other issues? Does he have post-viral syndrome (i.e. ME/CFS?). They speculate it may be the result of brain inflammation caused by Ebola. (The Ebola is gone but the brain inflammation remains?). It sounds so much like ME/CFS....

• http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/08/h...p-stories-below&WT.nav=top-stories-below&_r=0

Dr. Crozier, 44, ruefully calls himself a poster child for “post-Ebola syndrome”: Besides eye trouble, he has had debilitating joint and muscle pain, deep fatigue and hearing loss. Similar problems are being reported in West Africa, but it is not clear how common, severe or persistent they are. There have even been reports of survivors left completely blind or deaf, but these accounts are anecdotal and unconfirmed.
.........
At ELWA Hospital in Monrovia, Liberia, run by the missionary group SIM, Dr. John Fankhauser, the medical director, said chronic pain, headaches and eye trouble were the most common physical problems among the hundred or so people attending a special clinic for Ebola survivors. Some have such severe pain that they find it hard to walk..

“We’re seeing symptoms in patients who’ve been out of the treatment unit for up to nine months,” Dr. Fankhauser said. “They’re still very severe and impacting their life every day.” These patients will need medical care for months and maybe years, he predicted.

 

[Merry]

Dr. Abdul El-Sayed discusses the news that a doctor thought cured of Ebola now has vision problems because the virus is in his eye. The virus may be cleared from the blood but remain in the eye, ear, and testes. I had not known that some parts of the body the immune system does not have access to. Please correct me if I misunderstood what was said in the video.

http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/live-news/2015/5/stunning-ebola-news-dicovered.html

 

[Issie]

Makes me wonder if it's not a virus but unidentified Protozoa. With the one I have -it's forever. You have to continue to manage it. If the immune system is faulty that's where the problem lies. If it worked right it would attack what shouldn't be there.

Issie

 

[Cort]

Check out the measles thread as well

• http://cortjohnson.org/forums/threa...tly-weakens-the-immune-system-for-years.2441/

 

[Merry]

Vincent Racaniello, in a blog post yesterday, 18 June 2015, discussed a study of the long-term health consequences for some people who survive an Ebola infection:

[/
The results show that survivors of Bundibugyo ebolavirus infection are at significantly greater risk than controls for long term health problems. These include ocular problems (pain, blurred vision), loss of hearing, sleep difficulty, and joint pain. Other issues are abdominal and back pain, fatigue, impotence, severe headaches, memory problems and confusion. No differences in results of blood analyses were observed between the two groups. This study only included adults; children who have recovered should also be examined as their health care needs may be different.

These results confirm that there are long-term sequelae of Ebolavirus infection. The basis for the complications is not known, but is likely a consequence of tissue damage due to viral replication and the immune response. Whether or not virus was present in the patients was not determined. However it is known that Ebolavirus can persist in the testicles and eye long after it is absent from serum.

Other serious viral infections are also accompanied by long term health effects. For example, 29% of Lassa virus survivors have hearing loss, while joint pain persists for 3-5 years in about 10% of those infected with chikungunya virus.
quote]

http://www.virology.ws/2015/06/18/long-term-effects-of-ebolavirus-infection/

 

[Cort]

Vincent Racaniello, in a blog post yesterday, 18 June 2015, discussed a study of the long-term health consequences for some people who survive an Ebola infection:

Very interesting! I have a blog coming out on a similar topic today and am going to put that in there...thanks

 

[Cort]

I put this in response

"Fascinating discussion but nothing that many people with chronic fatigue syndrome or fibromyalgia whose illness started with an infection wouldn't immediately recognize. The Dubbo studies indicated that about 10% of people who come down with a wide variety of infections from bacterial to viral either don't fully recover (get ME/CFS/FM) or take a long time to recover. The only risk factors for lingering illness that emerged in followup studies was the severity of the initial illness.....

It's amazing how our medical system disregards these people for whom an infection, whether Ebola or not, turns out to be a life-changing event."

 

[Merry]

Thank you, Cort, for speaking up for our community. That was a well-written response.

 

[Cort]

I was surprised he didn't connect us in there! Maybe he will now.

 

[Merry]

In this past week Slate published a long article by Amy Maxmen on the continuing problems, both physical and social, of Ebola survivors:

http://www.slate.com/articles/healt...rra_leone_who_conference_and_how_to_help.html