Very rapid weight loss, insomnia, hallucinations, reduced mobility or concentration disorders: a neurological disease worries the province of New Brunswickin Canada, reports The Guardian. It would mainly affect young people, and would have appeared two years ago. The alert only started in the spring of 2021. Officially, the figures are 48 patients, but the daily evokes a larger figure of 150 people.
Doctors haven’t given her a name yet, don’t know exactly where she came from. Corn the environmental track is explored, after 9 people developed symptoms at the same time. While a man was consulting for ataxia (lack of balance) and dementia, his wife started having great difficulty sleeping, having hallucinations, and other muscular disorders.
A clinic specializing in neurodegenerative disorders, called the Mind Clinic in the city of Moncton, is leading the investigation. But the data is complicated to process, to clearly distinguish patients whose symptoms can be linked to an existing neurological disease, and those affected by this strange pathology. To establish the diagnosis, it is sometimes necessary to wait until death to proceed with the autopsy and the correct examinations.
Environmental contamination?
So far, 8 people have died from it, but the authorities have communicated by citing misdiagnoses and various pathologies… That said, as the Guardian explains, the experts are leaning towards a separate neurological disease for this cluster, in particular because the people affected are young and this type of disease is rare at this age.
For the time being, the region believes that no contaminated food or environmental cause can be at the origin of these cases. According to testimonies collected by the daily, testing for toxic substances would be held back by the authorities, “New Brunswick specifically asked us not to go further on this subject”, specify the scientists. These think of a non-protein, neurotoxic amino acid, β-N-methylamino-L-alanine (or BMAA), in particular known to cause degeneration of the central nervous system, as responsible for this epidemic. Moreover, the scan of a woman apparently affected by this mysterious disease, with the same symptoms as the other cases, revealed atrophy in the brain.
Source: Whistleblower warns baffling illness affects growing number of young adults in Canadian province, The Guardian (January 2, 2022).
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