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Morgellons: Mystery Illness Or Delusional Parasitosis?

BlackRiverFalls said:
Ithankfully it's been years since i've had to physically peel my bed clothes off the offending areas...

:shock: Ugh!

but it's difficult to see how we're getting from these to fibrous tubules on the skin - hairlike residue from the thread being cut on the HDPE bottles? some natural process slewing it off the inside of pipes?

Thats the weird thing for me, it might be a substance used in fairly common an innocuous items, but how is it getting turned into this form? It's not like you see woolly milk cartons and if a tupperware container was shedding like that, you'd throw it away before you shoved your sandwiches in it. :?
 
The only thing that springs to my mind, and I can't imagine what the mechanism would be for this, is that the bodies of those afflicted are exuding the foreign substances inescapably ingested by all of us living in this polluted, plastics dominated world. Highly unlikely of course but this is a Fortean board after all!
 
Thats the weird thing for me, it might be a substance used in fairly common an innocuous items, but how is it getting turned into this form?

HDPE is a polymer of Ethene/Ethylene, which is both naturally occuring and manufactured in huge volumes for the polymer industry, so very very speculatively, where you've got ethene, you've got the potential for HDPE...

Ethylene is colorless, has a pleasant sweet faint odor, and has a slightly sweet taste, and as it enhances fruit ripening, assists in the development of odour-active aroma volatiles (especially esters), which are responsible for the specific smell of each kind of flower or fruit. In high concentrations it can cause nausea. Its use in the food industry to induce ripening of fruit and vegetables, can lead to accumulation in refrigerator crispers, accelerating spoilage of these foods when compared with naturally ripened products.

Ethylene has long been in use as an inhalatory anaesthetic. It shows little or no carcinogenic or mutagenic properties, and although there may be moderate hyperglycemia, post operative nausea, whilst higher than nitrous oxide is less than in the use of cyclopropane. During the induction and early phases, blood pressure may rise a little, but this effect may be due to patient anxiety, as blood pressure quickly returns to normal. Cardiac arrythmias are infrequent and cardio-vascular effects are benign. Exposure at 37.5% for 15 minutes may result in marked memory disturbances. Humans exposed to as much as 50% ethylene in air, whereby the oxygen availability is decreased to 10%, experience a complete loss of consciousness and may subsequently die. Effects of exposure seem related to the issue of oxygen deprivation.

In mild doses, ethylene produces states of euphoria, associated with stimulus to the pleasure centres of the human brain. It has been hypothesised that human liking for the odours of flowers is due in part to a mild action of ethylene associated with the plant.

...however, the usual mechanism for polymerising ethene requires very specific catalysts which don't appear to be stable in air, and from the above quote, people do seem to have been given ethene as an anaesthetic without it being mentioned that they burst out in tubules or anything...

i still think the most likely explanation in this case is a wound contaminant, poss. a misidentified clothing fibre, but it would be quite something if it turned out the body could make synthetic polymers.

while we're at a loss for an explanation, perhaps we could save up all the odd fibres donated by people with morgellans, spin them and knit them into a jumper...
 
jefflovestone said:
crunchy5 said:
Some interesting videos and photo's of supposed morgellons fibres.

http://tinyurl.com/yjlw7w

Cheers for that, I'd have never thought to look on there for this kind of material (no pun intended).

Here's some more

A disease in which individuals have the growth of fibers from their skin that burn at 1,700 degrees F and do not melt. (20)(* see below) A private study to determine the chemical and biological composition of these fibers has shown that the fibers' outer casing is made up of high density polyethylene fiber (HDPE).
:shock:



I know this is asking a lot, but are there any other confirming sources for the HDPE analysis?

Some of the chemtrail investigators have discussed the addition of EDB (ethelene dibromide) to JP8 (jet fuel).
 
beakboo said:
The only thing that springs to my mind, and I can't imagine what the mechanism would be for this, is that the bodies of those afflicted are exuding the foreign substances inescapably ingested by all of us living in this polluted, plastics dominated world. Highly unlikely of course but this is a Fortean board after all!

I think the mechanism that could create that is more scarey than the end product!
 
BlackRiverFalls said:
HDPE is a polymer of Ethene/Ethylene, which is both naturally occuring and manufactured in huge volumes for the polymer industry, so very very speculatively, where you've got ethene, you've got the potential for HDPE...

In a bad Scots accent
"Are we still using polymers?" :p

Ethylene is colorless, has a pleasant sweet faint odor, and has a slightly sweet taste, and as it enhances fruit ripening, assists in the development of odour-active aroma volatiles (especially esters), which are responsible for the specific smell of each kind of flower or fruit. In high concentrations it can cause nausea. Its use in the food industry to induce ripening of fruit and vegetables, can lead to accumulation in refrigerator crispers, accelerating spoilage of these foods when compared with naturally ripened products.

Ethylene has long been in use as an inhalatory anaesthetic. It shows little or no carcinogenic or mutagenic properties, and although there may be moderate hyperglycemia, post operative nausea, whilst higher than nitrous oxide is less than in the use of cyclopropane. During the induction and early phases, blood pressure may rise a little, but this effect may be due to patient anxiety, as blood pressure quickly returns to normal. Cardiac arrythmias are infrequent and cardio-vascular effects are benign. Exposure at 37.5% for 15 minutes may result in marked memory disturbances. Humans exposed to as much as 50% ethylene in air, whereby the oxygen availability is decreased to 10%, experience a complete loss of consciousness and may subsequently die. Effects of exposure seem related to the issue of oxygen deprivation.

In mild doses, ethylene produces states of euphoria, associated with stimulus to the pleasure centres of the human brain. It has been hypothesised that human liking for the odours of flowers is due in part to a mild action of ethylene associated with the plant.

...however, the usual mechanism for polymerising ethene requires very specific catalysts which don't appear to be stable in air, and from the above quote, people do seem to have been given ethene as an anaesthetic without it being mentioned that they burst out in tubules or anything...

i still think the most likely explanation in this case is a wound contaminant, poss. a misidentified clothing fibre, but it would be quite something if it turned out the body could make synthetic polymers.

while we're at a loss for an explanation, perhaps we could save up all the odd fibres donated by people with morgellans, spin them and knit them into a jumper...[/quote]

It was any claimed transformation from fibres to formed product and the back to fibres that was bothering me and as you say, there's got to be some pretty specific transformative processes at work.

However, I'm not so sure about the misindentification. I'm sure some of it will be, but, contamination aside, for them all to be misidentified creates this - in my mind - bizarre witness/observer situation, similar to 'UFO' observers, where no one's experience is to be trusted/accepted.

Which leads us back to where the Morgellons story started with sufferers being written off as delusional and that there was no physical basis to any of this. :)
 
Philo_T said:
Some of the chemtrail investigators have discussed the addition of EDB (ethelene dibromide) to JP8 (jet fuel).

I'd been thinking along a chemtrail route, OT maybe, but has anyone seen the report that everyone tested in a 40 (I think) state high number of test subjects survey every person tested had Perchlorate in their urine.
 
However, I'm not so sure about the misindentification. I'm sure some of it will be, but, contamination aside, for them all to be misidentified creates this - in my mind - bizarre witness/observer situation, similar to 'UFO' observers, where no one's experience is to be trusted/accepted.

The difficulty there is that, referring back to page 1 of this thread, previous analyis or attempts to analyse the fibres have given very different results:

The material — which she said was cellulose plant fibers — were similar to each other but unlike anything either of them had ever seen.

He sent several specimens to a mold expert for analysis. The fibers were put in culture dishes to grow, but only a fungus called candida tropicalis was found.

Harvey also found tiny worms on a patient’s scalp that later proved to be the nymph form of a feline parasite — a tapeworm that preys on cats and shouldn’t be found on humans. Other patients were infested with forms of algae, other plant pathogens, or candida tropicalis, the fungus found in the laboratory culture of the “fibers.”

Wool is cellulose based, so it's not unfeasible we're looking at a wound contaminant in that case, granted there were still identification issues, but it isn't specified whether there was any 'control' in this analysis e.g. to establish what wool fibres might look like after someone's immune systems been at them for a while.

Out of place worms? Tropical fungus? HDPE? Really the mind boggles, and the different analyses throw up more questions than they give answers... the only overarching connection i can see is poss. a similar response in all cases to different kinds of foreign material...


I'd been thinking along a chemtrail route, OT maybe, but has anyone seen the report that everyone tested in a 40 (I think) state high number of test subjects survey every person tested had Perchlorate in their urine.

According to the wiki entry for Perchlorate:

Low levels of perchlorate have been detected in both drinking water and groundwater in 35 states in the US according to the Environmental Protection Agency. In 2004, the chemical was also found in cow's milk in the area with an average level of 1.3 parts per billion ("ppb" or µg/L), which may have entered the cows through feeding on crops that had exposure to water containing perchlorates.[1] According to the Impact Area Groundwater Study Program [2], the chemical has been detected as high as 5 µg/L in Massachusetts, well over the state regulation of 1 µg/L.

In some places it is being detected because of contamination from industrial sites that use or manufacture perchlorate. In other places, there is no clear source of perchlorate. In those areas it may be naturally occurring or could be present because of the use of Chilean fertilizers, which were imported to the U.S. by the hundreds of tons in the early 19th century. One recent area of research has even suggested that perchlorate can be created when lightning strikes a body of water, and perchlorates are created as a byproduct of chlorine generators used in swimming pool chlorination systems.

As of 2006, the EPA has not yet determined whether perchlorate is present at sufficient levels in the environment to require a nationwide regulation on how much should be allowed in drinking water. In 2005, U.S. EPA issued a recommended Drinking Water Equivalent Level (DWEL) for perchlorate of 24.5 µg/L. In early 2006, EPA issued a “Cleanup Guidance” for this same amount. Both the DWEL and the Cleanup Guidance were based on a thorough review of the existing research by the National Academy of Science (NAS). This followed numerous other studies, including one which suggested human breast milk had an average of 10.5 µg/L of perchlorate.[3] Both the Pentagon and some environmental groups have voiced questions about the NAS report, but no credible science has emerged to challenge the NAS findings.

I'm not sure how you'd get from that to HDPE or similar polymers, but there's a more viable route there from EDB, which though it's banned in the US as a pesticide, appears still to be in use in India. There also seems to be some concern that EDB may be in drinking water, at least inasmuch as water filters are being manufactured that claim to filter for it.

That said, given the high level of interchangability, under the right conditions, between a lot of 'organic' chemicals, if we assume that the human body can make HDPE, it's tricky to see why EDB or a number of other possible contaminants should be more viable as a starting point than a lot of organic compounds (and esp. fats) that are already present in large amounts in us naturally.
 
beakboo said:
The only thing that springs to my mind, and I can't imagine what the mechanism would be for this, is that the bodies of those afflicted are exuding the foreign substances inescapably ingested by all of us living in this polluted, plastics dominated world. Highly unlikely of course but this is a Fortean board after all!

It might well be a result of pollution. ...Or maybe, even a smidgin of Evolution? (me being a cup half full type a gal!)
Possibly with 'Sathya Sai Baba' being in the lead, with his heaps of exuding ash!?
Although I still can't see what purpose the ash/fibres etc.. serve?
Suppose I might have to wait till I evolve my feelers!...
 
Sadly that seems to be the default position of a large section of doctors. Dont know what it is, cant find it on standard tests or if it sounds dubious then it *must* be psychological. And I have enough friends that have come across many, many of those sorts of doctors in the UK :(

It is a big, weird old world out there.
 
A bit of research with some depth here, assuming it's true. 8)

http://www.rense.com/morgphase/phase2_1.htm

INTRODUCTION

Several batches of unknown suspect fibers were sent to the laboratory over a period of several weeks. We were asked to examine them, study them microscopically, determine some physical properties, and run elemental analysis by energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and chemical groups by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). Also some samples would be analyzed by Fourier transform Raman spectroscopy (FT-Raman).

Laboratory personnel would also compare the fibers with some other nanofibers reported to be carbon-silicon fibers with photoluminescent and other properties.

NOTE: All Samples were compared to the "Goldenhead" as found by Dr. Rahim Karjoo and Dr. Hildegarde Staninger (October 28, 2006) and a fiber that was identified as High Density Polyethylene Fiber (HDPE).


RESULTS

1) Visually a few of the fibers resembled the carbon-silicon fibers previously studied by Integrative Health International, LLC.

2) Close-up photos and photomicrographs (1,000 x) were taken of most samples.

3) Many strange shapes and lumps were seen and some could not be identified.

4) Identification of the photomicrographs were identified to contain a "foreign fiber" or not. These fibers were then selected for further testing and melting points.

5) A FTIR spectrum of one spot on the fiber indicated the presence of high density polyethylene fiber plus a trace of another material (brown gel).

6) EDS and Raman results will be discussed in Phase II and Phase III of this report.


SUMMARY

The fibers identified, gel material, and gel shaped materials had no cellular integrity with no eukaryotic cells. The materials identified in the fibers were of a manufactured nano technology to form a specific structure with an undetermined function. The chemical composition of fibers that had EDS and Raman did not match the chemical composition of the human body nor were they any part of the human body (nails, hair, skin, nerves, etc.).

Special features as identified by Los Angeles County Fire Department, Los Angeles, CA personnel are the following: 1) skin melts or burns at above 165 degrees F; 2) fibers from a human body that do not melt at 1,400 degrees F or above 165 degrees are not made of human cells; and 3) human tissue does not secrete gels nor would they be of known human cellular composition that melt above 300 degrees C (i.e. approximately over 600 degrees F).

All samples that did have a fiber that matched nanotechnology as compared to the original "Goldenhead" was identified as a "Morgellon Like Fiber": 1) discarded Morgellon Goldenhead; 2) fully formed Morgellon Goldenhead; or 3) deteriorating Morgellon Goldenhead. The structured material/fibers identified were ones that would have properties to self assemble, enlarge, and/or fold/expand. They were identified as nanotechnology (man-made)1 and were not identified in any way to be composed of eukaryotic cells, animal, plant, nor composed of any live biological form. Some specimens had "biological artificial" appearances that are known as artificial life or pseudo-life forms. These types of artificial life forms are known to use DNA/RNA/siRNA or sRNA plasmid templates of viruses, microorganisms, animal/plant proteins and/or enzymes to build the artificial technology structural form at nano level. Furthermore, they are not limited to only these referenced life forms plasmids, enzymes, and/or proteins.


Dr. Hildegarde Staninger, RIET-1, Principal Investigator, IHI, LLC Dept. Research & Dev.
Industrial Toxicologist/IH & Doctor of Integrative Medicine

Footnotes:
1 Man-Made means not made by nature or found in nature.

Morgellons Photos, Special Program #6, Page Three of Five
http://www.rense.com/general74/morg6-3.htm

INTRODUCTION

Several batches of unknown suspect fibers were sent to the laboratory over a period of several weeks. We were asked to examine them, study them microscopically, determine some physical properties, and run elemental analysis by energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and chemical groups by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). Also some samples would be analyzed by Fourier transform Raman spectroscopy (FT-Raman).

Laboratory personnel would also compare the fibers with some other nanofibers reported to be carbon-silicon fibers with photoluminescent and other properties.

NOTE: All Samples were compared to the "Goldenhead" as found by Dr. Rahim Karjoo and Dr. Hildegarde Staninger (October 28, 2006) and a fiber that was identified as High Density Polyethylene Fiber (HDPE).

The following results specifically address the tests performed on the High Density Poly-ethylene (HDPE) fiber from a patient of Dr. Staninger's whom she consulted with at IntroCell, LLC, Pensacola, FL. The specimen sample was from a piece of skin that fell from "BB's" foot Sample No. 12938-A. Sample No. 12938-1 and 12938-3 will be addressed for SEM/EDS data.

RESULTS

1) Visually a few of the fibers resembled the carbon-silicon fibers previously studied by Integrative Health International, LLC.

2) Close-up photos and photomicrographs (1,000 x) show the pink fiber to the left of picture of Sample No. 12938-A.

3) A FTIR spectrum of one spot on the fiber indicated the presence of high density polyethylene fiber plus a trace of another material (brown gel). Fiber size 0.8 um and a melting point of 115 degrees C.

4) SEMS/EDS results show various concentrations as stated below

Sample Number 12938, % composition

A 1 3
Element Found "BB" Square Slides JS
Sodium (Na) - 3.510 16.304
Aluminum (Al) - 18.961 19.420
Sulfur (S) - 72.331 35.419
Chloride (Cl) - 12.075 7.149
Ca - 7.120 9.435
Copper (Cu) - 1.990 -
Calcium (Ca) - 0.980 9.435
Phosphorous (P) - - 19.420
Carbon, C yes yes yes
Oxygen (O) yes yes yes
HDPE, fiber yes carbon/silica No
Melting Point, oC 115 None Stated None Stated



SUMMARY

The fibers identified, gel material, and gel shaped materials had no cellular integrity with no eukaryotic cells. The materials identified in the fibers were of a manufactured nano technology to form a specific structure with an undetermined function. The chemical composition of fibers that had EDS and Raman did not match the chemical composition of the human body nor were they any part of the human body (nails, hair, skin, nerves, etc.).

Special features as identified by Los Angeles County Fire Department, Los Angeles, CA personnel are the following 1) skin melts or burns at above 165 degrees F; 2) fibers from a human body that do not melt at 1,400 degrees F or above 165 F degrees are not made of human cells; and 3) human tissue does not secrete gels nor would they be of known human cellular composition that melt above 300 degrees C (i.e. approximately over 600 degrees F).

Sample 12938-A "BB"

The specimen shows carbon and oxygen present with the EDS test. The other elements were to minimal to be detected. The specimen was tested with Raman Test and found to be High Density Polyethylene Fiber (HDPE) with a trace of another compound. The other compounds have not been identified. Its Melting Point is 115 degrees C with a 0.8 um length.

Sample 12938-1 "Square Slides"

The specimen had no calcium present but did have high amount of sulfur with trace copper. It did contain sodium, aluminum, and chloride. These are all used as a battery or catalyst in creating a battery similar to the Edison Cell or Lead Cell. Edison cell type batteries utilize iron, potassium hydroxide, and nickel oxide, while a lead cell type uses

Lead, lead oxide, lead sulfate and hydrogen sulfate. Note copper in this sample. A compound known as chalcopyrite, CuFeS2 is roasted in an air process to create copper sulfate, iron oxide and sulfuric acid. When sand (silicon dioxide, SiO2) is added a low melting point occurs and produces iron silicate. Copper is very oxidative with various stages, but in its cupric copper stage a blue color is obtained when it is contained within 4 to 5 water molecules (CuSO4 . 5H2O. The blue color of this solid is due to the Cu+2 ion hydrated by four of the five water molecules in a surrounding square planner arrangement.

Specimen 12938-3 "JS"

JS has submitted previous samples and did have the "Goldenhead" identified in her samples with a melting point of above 1400 degrees F by Toxicological Pathology studies of Dr. Hildegarde Staninger and Dr. Rahim Karjoo.

Sodium is present with significant aluminum, phosphorous and primarily sulfur. Chloride is present with calcium. Calcium was not present in 12938-1, while copper was present.

Sulfur was 35.419 % in this specimen and 72.331 % in Sample No. 12938-1 ("Square Slides"). All of the transitional elements and other halogens are reactive or establish various valence stages when exposed to water. It is believed that these elements using the bio terrain they are in as their resource for building materials utilize various to develop into various fibers and other artificial nano life forms. It is very important to note any amount of cupric ion is toxic to lower organisms, so it is used to suppress the growth of algae in ponds and fungi and molds on vines. Bordeux mixture used to spray grapes and potatoes is made of copper sulfate and lime.

Calcium carbonate (which has been made into double walled nano tubes with carbon), CaO3, decomposed upon heating to form carbon dioxide gas, CO2 and calcium oxide (lime), CaO: + under a vacuum at 800 degrees F. If not done under a vacuum other compounds can from such as methane, oxygen, carbon dioxide and water. It may be noted that in ALL of the samples (ChemTrail, 12938-A, and -1) any sample with calcium and oxygen may have originally been calcium carbonate and lime. The samples with copper, sulfur, calcium and oxygen may have been similar compounds such as Bordeux mixture but at a nano scale level. These statements are based on the data received and history of a burning glass needle injection feeling by some Morgellon individuals.

A future question would be what is keeping these nano materials at equilibrium and what is their life expectancy under "normal" and "varying" conditions.

Lots of charts photo's and graphs on the link.
 
Some specimens had "biological artificial" appearances that are known as artificial life or pseudo-life forms. These types of artificial life forms are known to use DNA/RNA/siRNA or sRNA plasmid templates of viruses, microorganisms, animal/plant proteins and/or enzymes to build the artificial technology structural form at nano level. Furthermore, they are not limited to only these referenced life forms plasmids, enzymes, and/or proteins.

Could someone translate that into english for me?

I thought at first he was suggesting some sort of viral capsid origin for the fibres, though that shouldn't be giving rise to inorganic fibres... but rereading it, it doesn't make a huge amount of sense to me...
 
I think they're saying it appears to be some kind of nanotech, be it an accidental release, alien or population thin down escapade by TPTB. It also seems to have a link with chemtrails that may be giving it succour or trying desperately to control it. It may be the "grey goo" Prince Charles was trying to warn us about.
 
or the 'black oil' the x-files was trying to warn us about? :shock: :D :?

Dr. Hildegarde Staninger certainly seems to have some impressive credentials, and veers info the fortean in places... the biog page mentions her thoughts on fluoride in water... but i can't help thinking she's getting a bit speculative suggesting some form of rogue nanotech as a cause for morgellans...
 
I'm very much against Fluoridation of drinking water supplies, though I believe my area has it.
 
Ahhh, reviving an old favourite of mine just fore the sake of it!
Morgellons.
Didn't search for 'em, they just found me, so I wondered if there were any news or new pictures [love them...] and there was this from last year. The article was a bit "nothing new", I really enjoyed the following debate.
Some are just bat-shit-crazy whilst others seem quite down to earth. Most interesting links don't work [conspiracy no doubt] but man this is such good read.
I wouldn't dismiss them all as mad. I actually think that there is something science should really look into.

http://www.timesocket.com/disease/morge ... and-story/
 
Thanks for reviving this thread, I always found it pretty interesting...
 
It's a genuine problem, though all the indications are that it's psychogenic - the main thing is to try and remove the stigma from that so it can be treated. The CDC seem to be taking a sensible approach.

Simply getting one of the the fibres professionally analysed might answer some questions - but if they don't get the 'right' answer I suspect the questioner might simply dismiss it.
 
I thought they had those strands analysed and could only say that it was not natural. Which could mean man made or made of non natural materials, such as plastic or whatever. Having read through the comments, I sort of changed my mind a little from "Hey, its fluff caught in a wound" to "Maybe there is more to it than meets the eye".
Fortunately there are some scientists that do take it seriously, however whilst they know [I think, not too sure, see above] what these strands are, they can't explain how they get to where they are found.
It does seem that it could be [notice my careful expression ;) ] produced by the body.
Now nanotechnology could have something to do with it, as much as maybe our mixing of many chemicals during each day. Whilst all chems in our soap alone might not be too harmful, we don't know what reactions between soap, make up, shampoo and everything else might produce.

I can't really dismiss everyones experience as psychogenic even though it seems that "ignoring" the M's has helped a few. Maybe it is an interaction between mind and body. Who knows?
And that is why I still find it so interesting.
 
No, not really. This is the disease doctors think of when people tell them that they have Morgellons. Also we are talking artifical fibres and not living organisms in Morgellons.
Found this article, where he fibres have been looked at by police forensics:

http://www.naturalnews.com/025757_disea ... fiber.html

Makes for interesting reading.
 
Dingo667 said:
No, not really. This is the disease doctors think of when people tell them that they have Morgellons. Also we are talking artifical fibres and not living organisms in Morgellons.
Found this article, where he fibres have been looked at by police forensics:

http://www.naturalnews.com/025757_disea ... fiber.html

Makes for interesting reading.

Well, if you read further - something else is being suggested:

About the time that Dr. Wymore's forensic investigation of fibers was completed, a specialist in infectious disease detection, Ahmed Kilani, claimed to have broken down two fiber samples and extracted their DNA. He found that they belonged to a fungus.

Meanwhile, Vitaly Citovsky, Professor of Biochemistry and Cell Biology at Stony Brook University in New York, discovered the fibers contained the substance Agrobacterium Tumafaciens, the bacteria causing crown gall disease in plants (formation of tumors in more than 140 species of dicot plants). It is a genus of gram-negative bacteria capable of genetically transforming not only plants, but also other eukaryotic species, including humans.


So - various studies have "concluded" that these fibres are
a) artificial
b) have DNA from a fungus
c) are from bacteria causing disease in plants

That can't all be true, so we probably looking at a variety of causes here.
 
Now I feel itchy again. Wasn't William Harvey the bloke who discovered the circulation of blood?
Who coined the term Morgellons?
 
Dingo667 said:
I can't really dismiss everyones experience as psychogenic
I can do that, but it makes me feel like an insensitive clod.
 
Dingo667 said:
I can't really dismiss everyones experience as psychogenic

It shouldn't be a matter of 'dismissing' it. It's a real condition causing real suffering. The question is what lies behind it, and the evidence points towards something psychogenic. That may help with treatment.
 
Fairly long piece in The Guardian about morgellons.

Morgellons: A hidden epidemic or mass hysteria?

It's a mysterious condition that affects tens of thousands worldwide. But what is it?

It all started in August 2007, on a family holiday in New England. Paul had been watching Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix with his wife and two sons, and he had started to itch. His legs, his arms, his torso – it was everywhere. It must be fleas in the seat, he decided.

But the 55-year-old IT executive from Birmingham has been itching ever since, and the mystery of what is wrong with him has only deepened. When Paul rubbed his fingertips over the pimples that dotted his skin, he felt spines. Weird, alien things, like splinters. Then, in 2008, his wife was soothing his back with surgical spirit when the cotton swab she was using gathered a curious blue-black haze from his skin. Paul went out, bought a £40 microscope and examined the cotton. What were those curling, coloured fibres? He Googled the words: "Fibres. Itch. Sting. Skin." And there was his answer. It must be: all the symptoms fitted. He had a new disease called morgellons. The fibres were the product of mysterious creatures that burrow and breed in the body. As he read on, he had no idea that morgellons would turn out to be the worst kind of answer imaginable.

Morgellons was named in 2001 by an American called Mary Leitao, whose son complained of sores around his mouth and the sensation of "bugs". Examining him with a toy microscope, Leitao found him to be covered in unexplained red, blue, black and white fibres. Since then, workers at her Morgellons Research Foundation say they have been contacted by more than 12,000 affected families. Campaign group the Charles E Holman Foundation states there are sufferers in "every continent except Antarctica". Thousands have written to Congress demanding action. In response, more than 40 senators, including Hillary Clinton, John McCain and a pre-presidential Barack Obama, pressured the Centres For Disease Control And Prevention (CDC) to investigate; in 2006, it formed a special taskforce, setting aside $1m to study the condition. Sufferers include folk singer Joni Mitchell, who has complained of "this weird incurable disease that seems like it's from outer space... Fibres in a variety of colours protrude out of my skin: they cannot be forensically identified as animal, vegetable or mineral. Morgellons is a slow, unpredictable killer – a terrorist disease. It will blow up one of your organs, leaving you in bed for a year."

So it's new, frightening and profoundly odd. But if you were to seek the view of the medical establishment, you'd find the strangest fact about this disease: morgellons doesn't exist.

I meet Paul in a pub in a Birmingham suburb. He shows me pictures he's collected of his fibres. On his laptop, a grim parade of images flicks past. There are sores, scabs and nasal hairs, each magnified by a factor of 200. In each photo there is a tiny coloured fibre on or in his skin.

"Is it an excrement?" he asks. "A byproduct? A structure they live in?" A waitress passes with a tray of salad as he points to an oozing wound. "Is it a breathing pipe?"

Paul absent-mindedly digs his nails into a lesion just below the hem of his shorts. Little red welts pepper his legs and arms, some dulled to a waxy maroon, others just plasticky-white scar tissue.

He has seen an array of experts – GPs, allergy doctors, infectious diseases clinicians and dermatologists. Most end up agreeing with the skin specialist to whom he first took samples of his fibre-stained cotton: his sores are self-inflicted and he suffers from delusions of parasitosis (DOP), a psychiatric condition in which people falsely believe themselves to be infested. This particular form of DOP is thought to be unique, in that it's spread through the internet. Whereas in the past, episodes of mass hysteria were limited to small communities – perhaps the most famous being the witch panic in Salem, Massachusetts in the 1690s – today, imagined symptoms can spread much farther on the web.

etc etc
 
It's particularly annoying that no scientists with real credentials are willing to conduct some serious scientific investigation.
It's being dismissed with a shrug and talk about 'crazy people'. That's not solving anything at all.
 
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