Discovered: the underlying metabolic problem in ME

@ sciforschenonline:


The Aerobic Energy Production and the Lactic Acid Excretion are both Impeded in Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Mark Vink, Family Physician/GPwSI, Soerabaja Research Center, The Netherlands
E-mail: markvink.md@outlook.com

Abstract
Background: In this study the muscle bioenergetic function in response to exercise in severe ME was explored to see if the underlying metabolic problem in ME, responsible for the severe difficulties with trivial exercise, and the severe loss of muscle power, could be discovered.

Methods: Inorganic phosphate, creatine kinase and lactate were measured in a former Dutch National Field Hockey Champion, who is now a patient bedridden with severe ME, before and 5 minutes after very trivial “exercise”, from which his muscles needed 12 hours to recover.

Results: Inorganic phosphate and creatine kinase were both normal, however, lactate after this trivial exercise was very high, and further testing showed that a second batch of lactic acid was excreted after the same exercise with a 6-fold delay, showing that the lactic acid excretion was impaired and split into two. And this was delayed up to 11- fold by eating closer to the exercise.

Conclusion: This study found that in severe ME, both the oxidative phosphorylation and the lactic acid excretion are impaired, and the combination of these two is responsible for the main characteristic of ME, the abnormally delayed muscle recovery after doing trivial things. The muscle recovery is further delayed by immune changes, including intracellular immune dysfunctions, and by lengthened and accentuated oxidative stress, but also by exercise metabolites, which work on the sensitive receptors in the dorsal root ganglions, which in severe ME are chronically inflamed, and are therefore much more sensitive to these metabolites, which are produced in high quantities in response to trivial exercise, which for ME patients, due to the underlining metabolic problem, is strenuous exercise. And a similar problem is most likely responsible for the abnormally delayed brain recovery after doing trivial things.

This study also shows that the two metabolic problems are the result of an impaired oxygen uptake into the muscle cells or their mitochondria and in combination with the Norwegian Rituximab studies, which suggest that ME is an autoimmune disease, it is suggestive that antibodies are directly or indirectly blocking the oxygen uptake into the muscle cells or their mitochondria.

e-petition: stop unfair re-assessments for disabled people

stop unfair re-assessments for disabled people

Responsible department: Department for Work and Pensions

Stop the unfair and cruel re-assessments via ATOS for disabled people currently on Incapacity Benefit.

ESA is a flawed benefit, and puts terrible pressure and stress on vulnerable people, putting people who cannot work on lesser benefits and applying sanctions.

Source:
http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/9834

More evidence links pesticides to diabetes

By Amy Norton, NEW YORK | Wed Aug 17, 2011: (Reuters Health) - People with relatively high levels of certain pesticides in their blood may have an increased risk of type 2 diabetes -- particularly if they are overweight, a new study suggests.

The study, reported in the journal Diabetes Care, is not the first to link chemical pollutants to diabetes.

A number of studies have found a connection between diabetes risk and exposure to older pesticides known as organochlorines, PCBs and other chemicals that fall into the category of "persistent organic pollutants."

Organochlorines are now banned or restricted in the U.S. and other developed countries, after research linked them to cancer and other potential health risks. PCBs, which were once used in everything from appliances to fluorescent lighting to insecticides, were banned in the 1970s.

However, as the name suggests, persistent organic pollutants remain in the environment for years and build up in animal and human body fat.

Read more>>

Atos doctors could be struck off

Daniel Boffey, policy editor guardian.co.uk, Saturday 13 August 2011:

Twelve doctors employed by the firm that is paid £100m a year to assess people claiming disability benefit are under investigation by the General Medical Council over allegations of improper conduct.

The doctors, who work for Atos Healthcare, a French-owned company recently criticised by MPs for its practices, face being struck off if they are found not to have put the care of patients first.

The Observer has found that seven of the doctors have been under investigation for more than seven months. The other five were placed under investigation this year following complaints about their conduct.

It is understood that the majority of allegations concern the treatment of vulnerable people when the government's controversial "work capability assessments" were carried out, but the GMC refused to comment on individual cases. The development will add to fears over the pace and radical agenda behind the government's welfare-to-work policy, which led to protests in Westminster in May by thousands of disabled people. It will also raise concerns about ministers' commitment to Atos Healthcare, which was recently granted a three-year extension on its contract.

The government has repeatedly publicised figures showing that the "vast majority" of claimants for employment support allowance (ESA), which has replaced incapacity benefit, are fit for work. But four out of 10 of those who appealed the decision by Atos - whose parent company is run by a former French finance minister, Thierry Breton - to deny them benefits are successful on appeal, a process that costs the taxpayer £50m a year.

Last month Atos, whose staff assess around 11,000 benefit claimants a week, was savaged by the cross-party work and pensions select committee after it found that many people had "not received the level of service from Atos which they can reasonably expect".

MPs further claimed that a combination of the company's conduct and the test itself had prompted "fear and anxiety among vulnerable people".

One GP who attended an Atos recruitment fair told the Observer she feared doctors could become "agents of the state" who were deprofessionalised by involvement in a system that did not make patient care its first concern.

Campaigners for the disabled seized upon the development, claiming the government needed to go back to the drawing board. Richard Hawkes, chief executive of the charity Scope, said: "If the government wants to get disabled people off benefits and into work then it needs to get its assessment right. The test should be the first step on the road to employment. But disabled people's confidence in the work capability assessment is extremely low – and today's news will send it to rock bottom.

"The test is massively flawed. Now it appears that ...

Many kids with diabetes have other immune diseases

By Amy Norton, NEW YORK | Thu Apr 21, 2011:

(Reuters Health) - A third of children with type 1 diabetes have signs of other immune system disorders when they get diagnosed with diabetes, according to a new study.

The findings, researchers say, underscore the importance of keeping an eye out for symptoms of those diseases in diabetic children.

Type 1 diabetes is what's known as an autoimmune disease, where the immune system launches a misguided attack on the body's own tissue. In the case of diabetes, the assault kills off cells in the pancreas that make the blood-sugar-regulating hormone insulin.

Doctors have known for some time that people with type 1 diabetes also have higher-than-average rates of other autoimmune disorders, including autoimmune thyroid disease, the digestive disorder celiac disease, and Addison's disease, a disorder of the adrenal glands.

In the new study, researchers wanted to find out how common it is for children to have signs of those three diseases at the time of their type 1 diabetes diagnosis.

They did that by measuring blood levels of certain "autoantibodies" that serve as markers of the conditions. Autoantibodies are immune system proteins directed against the body's own cells.

Of the 491 children in the study, one-quarter had autoantibodies related to thyroid disease, and one in eight of those children had the disease itself.

Meanwhile, nearly one in eight had antibodies related to celiac disease, and a quarter of those kids had the disease. Five children (or 1 percent of the whole group) had Addison's autoantibodies, and the disease was confirmed in one of them.

The fact that a third of the kids had signs of other autoimmune diseases means parents and doctors should be on the lookout for the three disorders in diabetic children, according to researcher Dr. Jennifer M. Barker of the University of Colorado Denver, who led the new work.

Autoimmune thyroid disease arises when an immune system reaction causes the thyroid gland to produce either too much or too little thyroid hormone. An overactive thyroid can cause symptoms like nervousness, weight loss, sleep problems and intolerance to heat; an underactive one can cause fatigue, dry skin, hair loss and slow growth in height.

Celiac disease is a digestive disorder in which the immune system reacts to foods with gluten (a protein in wheat, barley and rye), damaging the small intestine. In Addison's disease, the adrenal glands cannot produce enough of the hormones cortisol or aldosterone, leading to problems like weakness and fatigue, appetite and weight loss, and irritability.

But while the current study used autoantibody testing to screen for the diseases, there are questions about using the tests in actual practice, according to Barker.

Right now, she told Reuters Health in an email, the American Diabetes Association recommends that children with type 1 diabetes be tested for thyroid disease and celiac disease at the time of their diabetes diagnosis. (After that, thyroid screening should be done yearly, and celiac testing if there are potential symptoms.)

Celiac screening has to be done with an antibody test. But doctors can screen for thyroid disease by measuring blood levels of thyroid-stimulating hormone. And there is debate, Barker said, about whether testing for thyroid antibodies would be useful.

"The presence of autoantibodies does not necessarily mean the child will develop the disease," Barker said.

As for Addison's disease, there are no guidelines on screening children with type 1 diabetes. But Barker said that parents and doctors should at least keep an eye out for symptoms of the disease -- as well as signs of celiac disease and thyroid problems.

In particular, she said, parents should pay attention to their children's growth and physical development, and keep track of any problems they are having with episodes of low blood sugar, abdominal pain, constipation or diarrhea.

It's estimated that anywhere from 15 percent to 30 percent of people with type 1 diabetes have autoimmune thyroid disease, while 4 percent to 9 percent have celiac disease, and less than 1 percent have Addison's.

SOURCE: bit.ly/e9SG59 Diabetes Care, online March 23, 2011.

Treating healthy people will make them ill

Clint Witchalls, newscientist.com, 1 February 2011:

Today, people don't just have diseases, they have pre-diseases: pre-diabetes, pre-hypertension, pre-obesity. In the face of pre-disease, otherwise healthy people seek treatment for potential ailments that show no symptoms, and maybe never will.
<--->
The book makes it clear that if a person has symptoms, they should get a diagnosis from their doctor. And, certainly, it recognises the benefit in diagnosing the silent conditions that often show no symptoms, such as hypertension.

But it argues against the constant changes to disease thresholds, which define more and more people as patients in need of medication or treatment. When, in 1997, the definition of diabetes changed from a fasting blood sugar level of 140 milligrams per decilitre to 126 milligrams per decilitre, 1.6 million Americans became diabetic at the stroke of a pen. Being classified as ill creates anxiety, and being treated with drugs, operations or other therapies can create unnecessary risk.

H. Gilbert Welch, the lead author, is no cheap contrarian, though. As a primary care physician in Vermont, he has seen the ill effects that come with treating patients too early ... Read more>>

Professor, can't face going bald? Fear not

Middle-aged man? Can't face going bald? Fear not. Combovers and weaves are out and hair transplants are on the rise.

Patrick Barkham, The Guardian, Wednesday 5 January 2011:

The mockery never stops. It was once jokes about dodgy syrups or slapstick featuring windblown combovers. Then a virtual team of cricketers, from Graham Gooch to Shane Warne, were dispatched into back-page magazine adverts but failed to erase the embarrassment associated with hair-loss treatments. "All that money and he's still got hair like a dinner lady," spat Boy George of Elton John, who appeared to confront his receding hairline with various fancy treatments over the years.

The scorn kept sprouting up, even this week when Gordon Ramsay has been ridiculed for looking "shockingly pale and bloated," as the Daily Mail put it, days after he had reportedly undergone a state-of-the- art hair transplant at the swanky Alvi Armani clinic in Beverly Hills.

But behind the social stigma of the balding that affects 25% of men in their 20s and 60% of men before they are 40 is a more shocking development: hair transplants are getting quite good, and men are starting to boast about their flash new rugs. Read more>>

Bacteria trigger production of key immune cells

Reuters, Thu Dec 23, 2010:

Allergies and autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis could one day be prevented by consuming a type of bacteria, like probiotics taken in yoghurt, according to a study published on Friday.

The researchers fed mice with a family of bacteria and found that it triggered the production of certain white blood cells, called regulatory T cells.

"By increasing regulatory T cells, they will help suppress many of our allergies and autoimmune diseases," said one of the scientists, Kenya Honda, an immunology associate professor at the University of Tokyo.

Regulatory T cells are white blood cells that regulate the immune system and prevent it from excessive reactions.

When an immune system goes into an overdrive, it can cause allergies. It can also destroy healthy cells and tissues and cause autoimmune diseases like ... Read more>>

Vitamin B1 prevents heart disease in diabetes

A dietary supplement of the synthetic derivative of vitamin B1 has the potential to prevent heart disease caused by diabetes, according to new research from the University of Bristol, funded by Diabetes UK. Vitamin B1 may help the body to dispose of toxins and therefore protect cells of the heart from becoming damaged.

Diabetes leaves the heart more vulnerable to stress as less oxygen and nutrients are delivered to the heart and other organs. Heart damage can be caused by high levels of glucose entering cardiovascular cells, which forms toxins that accelerate the ageing of the cell.

Around 50 per cent of people with diabetes die from cardiovascular disease, and this complication is ... Read more>>

XMRV Research - A Landmark for ME

Some years ago those suffering from diabetes and Multiple Sclerosis (MS) were denigrated and trivialised by the same type of establishment corruption which has been directed toward ME sufferers. Both diabetes and MS were illnesses which were regarded as psychiatric until insulin and MRI were discovered. The ability of an MRI scan to show the pathology of MS destroyed the psychiatrists who wished to portray that illness as "women's hysteria".

The discovery by the Whittemore-Peterson, the National Cancer Institute and the Cleveland Clinic researchers of xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) in ME patients may well be the equivalent defining moment for ME.

As our letter to the CMO in 2006 stated - "although there is much to learn about the details of these illnesses our present understanding and treatments have emerged from careful research studies that have exposed the inadequacies of the psychiatric models".

The WPI has tested more samples since submitting the first paper and our EMEA colleagues report of the interest around Europe in studying this. One Swedish clinical virologist has described this research as important as the discovery of HIV and already there are plans for studying this in Swedish ME patients.

The news of the XMRV research is really encouraging in bringing ME into the main stream media coverage and getting new researchers interested in the field, and wanting to reproduce the results. This is exactly what ME needs - to be perceived and treated as a mainstream organic illness needing funding to provide correct treatments.

Although the discovery is quite serious, as it is a retrovirus and therefore has its own consequences, we feel it is better in the long term for patients to know what is wrong with them rather than continually being left in limbo due to ignorance and outdated information.

Researchers will now have to study the XMRV virus, how it behaves etc. and it is necessary for governments and healthcare organisations to treat ME with the urgency it requires. We now have another biomarker which, of course, needs to be verified by other researchers first before we can be absolutely certain of its importance. There are bound to be people in support groups who have different reasons for their illness and we need biomarkers to make sure a diagnosis given is a correct one.

The WPI website states:

"We have detected the retroviral infection XMRV is greater than 95% of the more than 200 ME/CFS, Fibromylagia, Atypical MS patients tested. The current working hypothesis is that XMRV infection of B, T, NK and other cells of the innate immune response causes the chronic inflammation and immune deficiency resulting in an inability to mount an effective immune response to opportunistic infections."

Interestingly, in a discussion after this year’s IiME Pre-Conference Dinner presentation by Hillary Johnson, Professor Harald Nyland mentioned how some diseases need two viruses for a disease to develop. He also mentioned Burkitt’s lymphoma as an example where the presence of two viruses, EBV and malaria is needed.

The elapsed time taken by Science magazine in publishing the research findings may be seen as proof of the excellence of the work being performed by the team of researchers at the WPI, the NCI and the Cleveland Clinic.

There have been comments about Lombardi et al. not giving demographic details of the patients and controls used in the recently published XMRV study. Scientific journals have all their own rules governing the format in which they want research articles written. This XMRV study has been written according to the rules given by the Science magazine and all other interested researchers can request more detailed information on methodology etc. if they wish.

For Science to publish an article on ME is a landmark itself and has a huge positive effect on all biomedical ME research. Having the National Cancer Institute and the Cleveland Clinic working with the WPI and publishing these results, in a journal of the calibre of Science, is as good as it gets. This work should open up more funding opportunities for other existing biomedical ME researchers.

If the WPI and subsequent research does not conclusively prove that XMRV is the cause of ME it will at least have interested more researchers to participate in biomedical research in this area. And will have broken the mould.

We should all take this opportunity to make a real push for funding for more biomedical studies based on homogenous well defined patient groups. IiME will continue to campaign for biomedical research, and apply for grants for biomedical research, in the sure knowledge that good science eventually will win through.

Our view on the XMRV research is echoed by the words of Professor Martin Pall, a speaker at our 2007 conference -

"There have been comments in the media to the effect that this finally shows that CFS/ME is physiological, not psychological. This is true, but this should have been obviously true anyway, at least six or seven years ago. Nevertheless the media coverage of CFS/ME obtained by Mikovits and her colleagues must be viewed as a true gift to those interested in extending public knowledge of this disease."

The discovery of XMRV in ME patients has changed the ME/CFS landscape for good.

We have more detail on the XMRV research - click here .

Our statement on the research was published here .

enterovirus triggers diabetes

A common gastric virus may trigger diabetes, scientists have found, raising hopes that a vaccine can be developed.

Two separate teams of British researchers found strong evidence that enterovirus infection can trigger the immune reaction which leads to insulin-dependent diabetes. There was also a suggestion that viral infection may be involved in Type 2 diabetes, although how is not clear.

The virus family, which includes more than 100 different strains, can cause vomiting and diarrhoea but often produces no symptoms. By attacking insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, it is thought the viruses set off an immune response which spins out of control, leading to Type 1 diabetes.

MEntertainment

As You and Yours finished it’s much anticipated and in many ways enlightening week of broadcasting, it was time to GET back to business.

The Dr Speedy Show needed to be back on the road for some more MEntertainment. Well, I'm sorry, love, but it won't be.

Not unless someone from the GOBSART Observatory suddenly decides that there is whole month between the program and the next instalment.

The fact is that it took so much energy out of ME, just to put a few comments on the message board, that it will take me years to write enough material for another run of Dr Speedy and ME.

And then another couple of months to read them and read them so I am absolutely sure that no one GET’s offended and that it is still something you might actually want to read.

So trust me on this, no one has a clue when Dr Speedy will be back as a GP.

But assuming I do come back to the BLOGOSPHERE and GP-hood at some point in the future – before my superglue is dry that is, if I am lucky - my problems will be far from over.

Because as I write, some people have been so offended that I, or others, stated the blinding obvious that some of us were getting hate mail.

Yes seriously, just because we stated that by definition a neurological illness can’t be cured by wishy washy talky talky therapies.

It is that simple.

It is a bit like trying to talk the Island of Langerhans back to life so they will produce insulin again for the diabetics.

And the funny thing is, the CBT enthusiasts have actually been doing just that.

Well. At least if you believed everything it said in the Times a while ago.

So 001/7, you know our master blaster of the double world of spy hood went to see his royal E-414. And he got himself a little submarine.

He said, if the editors and the journalists are not doing their job, I will, and off he went in his submarine which basically was a sort of copy of the one you saw in that movie, yes, that yellow submarine one.

So on his journey to the Isles of Langerhans, he passed all sorts of interesting stuff. But not the kind you want to discuss with others.

So I have to keep my mouth shut as that is how he got in, in the first place.

His navigator was Major Tom and his TinTin worked pretty well, even in those confined spaces of the human body.

And they actually managed to find these Isles of Langerhans. And they were deserted.

The Sahara or the Kalahari are crowded in comparison. But he had just been informed that these Isles had been talked back to normalcy.

He even SMS’ed form the inner sanctuary to inform me that I should get the Times editor, that science bloke on the line, so he could tell him what he thought of talky talky carwashy therapy for diabetes and other physical diseases.

Utter nonsense as Our Clarkness would say.

And it appeared that no one had much of a clue what these islands should look like, let alone that they were actually as dry as a sandpit.

001/7 asked if they were sure that they were not able to produce any insulin, he even shouted at them, but there was no one there.

I'd therefore need your help.

Apparently if someone gets cured by GET, CBT, The Nickelodeon song, lightning 0.7, no that is not a special Bond or Earl Grey flavour, it is the latest version of the Godzilla Thunderbird program for your computer.

A sort of Inlook Exploder but than from the competition.

I even pointed out, with a lot of pain in my heart, that the COOL BLOGGING THERAPY and my GRADED LAUGHTER THERAPY, actually are fantastic but if they cure you, mister FUKUDA and his CBT mates had the diagnosis very wrong indeed.

Nothing new I know, but be careful when you point that out to people.

You might be a dictator, or whatever.

I, in my simple minds, don’t you forget about ME, was a great song even before this ME nation conquered my world.

I then started to search the internet and see what all these therapies were, some as others pointed out were plain advertisements, but I also came across a very old but peer reviewed and tested therapy called the Lockheed P38 Lightning.

They even handed out charts with compressibility differences between normal human beings and the one with the imagination of suggestion or suggestibility.

Some magic wand term to do with mental health problems in squirrels, our London Correspondent has discovered.

And then there was another problem.

When someone has had ME for years, as someone said on the message board, it turned out they had Lyme’s disease.

And they were happy because in general this is a condition that is treatable.

Really interesting phenomenon.

You take away their disease and tell them, look, the diagnosis was wrong, but this time round we can actually cure you. And they were happy.

I didn’t hear them say, but I really had ME.

The trouble though is that the main reason why this wastebasket problem has happened, is because of us doctors and psychiatrists in particular.

But even then, an ME expert, that is at least what the BBC said, announced that CFS, or ME, is basically glandular fever that doesn’t recover in a month or so but perseveres.

And then my ME world went upside down again.

I had loads of tests and one of them showed that I had had glandular fever in the past.

Now apparently, all ME patients are always in their doctor’s surgery moaning about anything and everything.

Or so I am told by the lovely talky brigade.

In one article this was caused because we were so lazy as a child, that even a goalpost on a soccer field was more active.

In another article by the same Blokeys we were not lazy, we were just malingering and running around until someone suggested, hey look mate, this ME thing is just great. A NICE fashion accessory you must have.

And so we all fell ill.

Now, when I had glandular fever, the silly thing is, I didn’t go to my GP.

First of all I just thought I had worked and studied to hard so I was just tired and needed a bit of a rest.

And I was right. And yes, I fully agree with this ME expert from the dark ages that this tiredness, without any other symptoms whatsoever, was absolutely the same as what I have now.

She couldn’t be more spot on.

And suddenly a lady announced that she had CFS but not ME.

And I thought, after reading her entry, this lady knows more about ME and CFS, and in particular the differences, than all these high paid so called experts.

Truly amazing.

But anyway, suddenly 001/7 appeared out of the human body with a big grin on his face.

On the way out he had discovered the only cell in the Isles that was still alive.

But it had told him that the rest of his family had been dead a long long time ago and his few friends that survived the Diabetes blast had succumbed to CBT-ism and were now court martialed as cowards.

The British Government had send out a general pardon in 2006 to the families of the cowards of the First World War who were executed as we doctors forget to tell the military that these soldiers had a mental health problem. But apparently they hadn’t, at least according to our beloved friend who is also a keen player of the ME game.

He is ranked, at least that is what he says, somewhere in the top ten or so of most influential types who don’t know what ME is.

Or does he have another idea, that brainfog thing is just so annoying.

Now, this professor is so old, he was actually there in the trenches when they were not only throwing metal at each other, but they also used some NICE chemicals that burn through your skin, eat your lungs away but you can’t actually see the little buggers.

Now, if you talk to a soldier then there is one thing they are all really scared of, and that is chemical warfare, bullets are alright, guns are fine, tanks are just big and bulky, but chemical warfare is very different.

But not according to this professor who was sitting in his mansion or his warm study with a cupper or a hot chocolate, and the only chemical warfare he knows, is when he buys a burger or anything else that is over the sell by date.

And he once wanted to run away as that was a scary experience, but as a man of the world, he could resist his urge, and so anybody who has been admitted for shellshock, not one, not twice, but three times before he couldn’t take things any more, was obviously a coward.

Welcome to collusional delusionism.

I hope the delusional workshop worked. Because this is just utterly amazing.

It is so amazing that I almost managed to walk again.

So if I was going to ditch anything of this ME business what would it be??

Well that suggestibility thingy might want to take a runner, my exercise phobia would be okay if it went on a world trip to Nowheristan, and my hysteria might do a film about lysteria.

The blue ones are actually really NICE.

And if I was going to be alright, it'd be featuring as James Bond, with John Martin as M in the movie, ME and our delusional world.

And who would want that???

ME on RADIO FOUR

This is John Martin reporting live from London for the Dr Speedy broadcasting service.

This morning I received a telephone tip-off. The caller could not give their name for security reasons but simply said "This is agent codenamed 001/7. I have information that needs to be worked on Speedily."

He then told me a surveillance team had been keeping an eye on a well known insurance company and I needed to check it out. This is what happened when I reached the coordinates 001/7 gave me.

I approached the building casually using some ME-6 training I picked up from watching Spooks. I realised I only had 55 minutes to save the world.

Sometimes people don’t appreciate the pressure us Spooks are under. It's a bit like having ME.

I could see there was a small dog chained to the front gates of the insurance company. It was a poodle. But I couldn't tell what type.

I observed the poodle closely and noticed something strange. Whenever an expensive car approached the building the little dog seemed timid, frightened and intimidated and could be seen cowering against the gates.

However whenever someone in a wheelchair tried to get past and into the building the little poodle would become confident, aggressive and nasty. It was as if its personality had completely changed.

Throughout the entire operation I was in contact with agent 001/7 through a hidden earpiece and microphone.

Dr Speedy knows his agents lives are in constant danger and insists our equipment is the best (unlike Tony Blair who sent our troops to Iraq under prepared, on a futile mission and equipped with dodgy gear).

"001/7" I said "I have located the building but I am unable to identify the target.

I can't put a name to the poodle" The voice of agent 001/7 came clearly through my earpiece for our commanding officer Dr Speedy always makes sure the equipment is checked and rechecked before every mission.

"John, he said "the target has been identified as the Psychiatric Poodle"

"Please confirm target 001/7." I requested "I thought you said Psychiatric Poodle"

"Target confirmed John. Please be careful it's a Psychiatric Poodle."

As 001/7 has worked with great distinction for the real ME-6 I didn't want to appear as though I'd only been watching Spooks so I pretended to know what he was talking about but quickly got out my Undercover Reporters Guide To Small Doggies.

There it was in black and white. The same colour as the poodle.

The Psychiatric Poodle my book said, was first seen in the Soviet Union in the 1970's where it would only attack democracy campaigners.

It was also seen in China in the 1990's where it would only attack religious believers.

It is also believed that the poodle was introduced to the UK in the late 1980's where it would only attack the sick and disabled.

I got back to 001/7 immediately on my concealed communication equipment. "How is it possible I asked to train a poodle to only attack the most vulnerable people in every society?"

"The reason the Psychiatric Poodle is so little thought of" said 001/7 is that you don't have to train it or issue any orders "You see the Psychiatric Poodle can anticipate its master’s wishes, and barks accordingly."

"Are all psychiatrists poodles?" I asked 001/7.

"Certainly not" he replied " Our organisation has the greatest of respect for many psychiatrists.

The Australian psychiatrist Dr Jean Lennane is no poodle, neither is the Swedish psychiatrist Per Dalen and the psychiatrist Victor Frankl was the bravest of the brave."

"What should I do 001/7?" I asked.

"I want you to go up to the little poodle and show him as much love and compassion as you can" said 001/7

"How can I?" I protested "they are attacking the sick and disabled, people like us, people with ME.”

"Look" said 001/7 "this is a difficult and dangerous job we do, but no-one said working for Dr Speedy was going to be easy.

Our organisation has been observing the Psychiatric Poodle for years and you don't have to do anything. History has its own way of taking care of this particular little beast. Just show it some compassion while it's still around."

"I'm going to follow orders and be nice to the little poodle" I said the words sticking in my throat. "I'm going to go over and show it lots of love and affection.”

"I'm proud of you" said 001/7 "but be careful John" he added "that little bastard could have your hand off."

Please remember the next time you hear a psycho babbler talk about ME, might be on the radio ACTUALLY, as the BBC is very kind to put ME and you in the spotlight on RADIO FOUR. Remember that we have moved forward so much in medicine, that we now have a blood test for almost anything and everything.

For example we can do one to see if you have a depression, if you have Alzheimer’s, a tennis elbow, DIABETES, and the first line of treatment I read in the TIMES a while ago was CBT, or was insulin still the preferred option for diabetes, I must say, I am not sure anymore.

Or many many other neurological illnesses that sometimes take years to diagnose. Because we doctors know it all, now I read that somewhere as well, but where??

Even something simple, like Celiac disease takes 5 years on average, and there is actually a blood test for this disease, no really.

And endometriosis takes a whopping NINE years to GET right.

So as you can see, we as doctors know everything and anything, and we have stopped a long time ago inventing new things, using new equipment, and so we don’t spend more and more each year on health care, to the delight of many governments and their deficits.

Luckily, otherwise we might cure some people and that was never the plan. Let alone getting the diagnosis right. It is so much nicer, really, to call people names. But different names each time so they GET dizzy just from listening to this psychiatric TOMBOLA of names, simply because these so called psychiatrists can't diagnose something so they keep changing their mind, and changing their mind, and changing their mind.

A medical TOMBOLA in a delusional way.

And I know, because after being a GP for many years, and now being in private practice I have had the pleasure of being called whatever people fancy. And the last works so much better than a real cure.

Amazing.

Why on earth do we bother to invent antibiotics, was a mistake actually, or insulin or asthma inhalers, if we know they are of no use at all.

As mind and body are one, I suggest, as recommended by our beloved friends, to treat any disease from no on, sorry that must be from now on, silly self thinking laptop, with CBT, and if you are really desperate, you will GET GET as well.

But only GET and CBT that is. So bin the medications, the painkillers, the sprays, the antibiotics, and what else there is in a pharmacy to treat diseases.

Waste of money. I love CBT, the almighty cure for delusionists, and you??

Mr Clarkson woke up this morning, having listened to a re-run of ME will be yours or so on Radio 4, and he wrote me this email, as he was delighted to see or hear in this case, that the psycho brigade have saved all the psychiatric patients, so they have changed over to neurology.

And he continued and said: “You may have noticed in recent years that the ME people are being stalked by a fleet of CBT blokeys. They look like psychiatrists with their verbal wishy washy talky talky and their magic wands. But they are not.

They are employed by the NHS to fill the gap left when PATIENTS with difficult diseases turn up and want to GET their lives back.

But as we all know, these so called helpers of Hippocrates, have abandoned the business of curing patients and have retreated to their desks for wishy washy talkie talkie nonsense, and writing article after article after article about absolutely nothing at all.

The remit of the CBT blokey is to get to the ME patients as fast as possible, ensure everyone is okay, as that is what they think ME means, clear the waiting room of ungrateful patients, and other debris, and get to their lunch or golf date as quickly as possible.

That sounds like a good idea, but unfortunately it’s a government scheme. So it’s all gone wrong.

The other day there was a small flog of ME folk stuck in the Magic KINGDOM of delusionism.

They were complaining of severe muscle pains, incredible brainfog, dizziness which I only get from sitting next to James May, when he tries to overtake a sleeping duck or snail, a few clumsy muscles, intolerance to noise, which I suffer from badly if I have to drive a normal car, and I think one of the patients had lost its job as well which gave him a headache.

No matter.

Everybody was in the right place as in in the MAGIC KINGDOM OF DELUSIONS.

All the patients looked well enough to be at work. Everybody was fine. At least that is what one of the CBT BLOKEYS shouted when I asked him what ME was.

You see, when I think of ME, I think of ME and big fast powerful cars. Preferably Italian stallions, with so much horsepower and seductiveness, that even at my age women fall for my incredible charm.

But no. The man with the magic wand in his hand decided that the patients who looked so well, were so severely ill, that all of them needed emergency CBT.

So, as you can imagine, the ME’ers were delighted.

When I got in the Lambo, and turned Radio Four on, I found out that on that one day, we had more patients with ME than with many other diseases and I therefore telephoned the NHS, which began by denying that ME existed at all.

Then it said that yes, two patients with ME had been spotted near the border of Scotland. And it stuck with this until I pointed out I had seen a dozen or two in a magical kingdom somewhere in a NICE neighborhood in London.

“Oh well,” said a spokeschairperson, “it might have been a few more than two but we wouldn’t know about that.”

What do they mean they wouldn’t know about that? Do these people have any idea how disabling ME can be? How can they think it’s so trivial that it doesn’t even exist?

The ME Association actually says that ME can have “serious effects on your family’s economy, your quality of life and [predictably] your environment”.

Damn right it can. Missed holidays. Ruined lives. Empty bank accounts. Broken marriages. Frayed tempers. And all of that is even before you get to the prognosis and uncertainty of getting your life back and doing the sporty things many ME people enjoyed before falling off the road to pensionhood.

Of course, it’s easy to see what’s happening. The CBT blokeys will have been told time and again that their stardom is the number one priority.

And that if they are dealing with a horrible illness, they should do everything in their power to ensure that CBT is the only available item on the menu.

In some cases, this means they won’t jump into a lake to save a young drowning boy with ME. In the KINGDOM, it means they won’t get out of their consultation rooms unless you have shut up, and are willing to undergo this utterly useless piece of so called treatment.

Even in the case of GET, also called Grannies Enjoyable Truffles, and you know what, I would always go for this kind of GET, as it is delicious and I know for a fact that I like it, as I have tried it, and so does my tummy.

But just read their reports. Every day a new one comes out, while six year olds can see that there is nothing to talkie talkie wishy washy treatments, other than a big fat cheque in the making.

It makes you wonder. Next time you need to see a shrink, could you escape up the embankment and across the fields with your ME? I think not. But without ME you could. I know for a fact as I have tried that.“

HYPOGLYCAEMIC COMA and ME

A few years ago an article appeared in the BMJ and the conclusion was that 50% or so of doctors DID NOT believe ME existed.

The reasoning behind it was that all routine bloodtesting and so is normal in ME.

Now interestingly enough, no one seems to know about Dr Ramsay and his little but very informative book about ME.

If you can’t remember who he was, he was the Infectious Disease Consultant who worked in the Royal Free Hospital, when they had an outbreak of ME in 1955, and they had so many nurses and doctors (most of them were males in those days, so please take note of this Mr CBT!!!) that they had to close the hospital for months.

There are many very interesting and important things in his book.

Not only did he write a medical account of this outbreak, but he also dedicated his life to this horrible illness.

Now for the NON believers, just have a look at this.

“Some patients report the occurrence of fainting attacks relieved by a small meal or just eating a biscuit; these attacks are the result of hypoglycaemia and we are reminded of three young women in the outbreak in Finchley who were admitted to hospital in an unconscious state, the result of acute hypoglycaemia.”

And how do you treat this??

With an intravenous infusion, see picture. So no CBT, or other psychobabble.

What would happen if a healthy person would not eat?

Just remember the many people who went on hungerstrike for whatever reason.v They get thinner and thinner and can survive without food, if they just drink water only, so no calories or nutrition, for 50 to 60 days.

That is, because a healthy body has two hormones regulating the sugar level in our blood.

And if we don’t eat, we will start to “EAT” our own body up.

But a healthy person can try as hard as they like, they won’t go into a hypoglycaemic coma.

The only other person who can manage that, as well as an ME patient, is an insulin dependant diabetic.

Did Mr NICE read this very informative BOOK???

Well, there is nothing in his NICE report indicating they did.

Did the MAGIC CBT KINGDOM ever read it???

They might, but they have never shown any indication whatsoever that they learned anything from it.

Far from it.

There are lots and lots of other interesting things in this book, it only cost less than ten pounds so you would think that an Institute, that calls themselves something of Excellence, and that is writing a guideline about ME, that they at least have a look at this book.

It is only 61 pages of text, and it is just slightly larger than a pocketbook.

So for someone with a healthy brain, how long will that take to read??

But NOT INTERESTED were Mr NICE and his palls at the CBT KINGDOM and in the Government. Remember, they went into a hypoglycaemic coma.

Yes I know that the CBT KINGDOM calls ME patients hypochondriacs, hysterics, malingerers, people who want to claim benefits, and all sorts of other NICE-ness.

But we are talking dear Mr NICE and dear Colleagues, and even dear MAGIC CBT KINGDOM, about hypoglycaemic coma.

That is just a bit more than the patients you tend to see in your KINGDOM and say they have ME when all they have is fatigue or a mental health problem.

Those are obviously problems that needs dealing with, but they have nothing to do with ME.

And why does this happen over and over again at the CBT KINGDOM???

Because getting the diagnosis of ME right is impossible at the CBT KINGDOM.

Why???

Because it is NOT in their interests.

They want money, lots of it, and that the patients suffer as a consequence is not important at all.

NICE filosofy, but I’m afraid very true indeed.

And what did Dr Ramsay say about this????

“The basic essential in treatment is CORRECT diagnosis.”

And please remember, doctors who think we can test for everything and we know it all, what Dr Saunders, a GP from Australia wrote in the BMJ rapid responses about ME, and which he kindly mailed to ME to use his response in my BLOG:

“Last TIP: remember, even if you don't believe it exists, you might still get it yourself.

There are studies suggesting that teachers and doctors are more at risk.”