Inflammation in the spinal cord in ME/CFS, "a condition that many doctors only recognise as an inappropriately named psychiatric illness"

By: Matthew Joseph Smith:

The culture of disbelief still persists, however. In today’s Guardian, there is a column by some doctor calling himself “Dr Crippen”, whose blog is to be found here. The general point, that legalising medically-assisted suicide raises a lot of dilemmas and that, as with legalised abortion, it will lead to things it was not intended to lead to, is valid. However, this paragraph is what causes offence:

A caring mother who kills her severely brain-damaged son is found guilty of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. A caring mother who kills her daughter who is suffering from “myalgic encephalomyelitis”, a condition that many doctors only recognise as an inappropriately named psychiatric illness, is found not guilty of murder. It is incomprehensible that she was found not guilty. Where is the logic? The law is clear, but juries are not prepared to enforce it. The law must therefore be changed.

However, whatever the best name for Lynn Gilderdale’s illness was, it certainly was not “merely” a psychiatric illness, let alone malingering. Why would someone who had been a happy, active teenage girl suddenly fake an illness and keep it up for seventeen years, then kill herself?

Lynn’s autopsy revealed inflammations to her spinal cord, as had been the case with an earlier victim, Sophia Mirza. Read more>>