Cause and Effect

This discussion document started out as an e-mail; originally posted to the MEActionUK mailing list. I developed it further into a short article and circulated it to the press and major uk tv stations in the hope that it might get published in some way.

From there I've had plenty of encouraging and enlightening feedback from many people - friends, family and others not so well known - all urging me to develop the themes of my article further. From the Original posting on the 9th May 2000 it has been extensively re written and revised up to June 5th.

I hope you find what you are about to read of interest. My intention is to refine the document further and to hand it over with another document full of supporting research evidence at the forthcoming Department of Health Sounding Board Event which takes place on the 7th of June at the Department of Health in London. I intend to distribute hard copies to all the key members of the Sounding Board Group and interested parties in the House of Commons as well as the House of Lords. Copies will also be sent to members of the Government Working Party and to the Chief Executives of both major M.E. Charities.

I'd like to add that I have only included personal references in this discussion paper to illustrate the themes I raise. As you will see, the references are all relevant. The contrast between a caring health service that I experienced 20 years ago and the failing institution that we have today is quite alarming.

My illness started off with food poisoning, which resulted in a "flair up" or auto immune response of reactive arthritis. I then got a flu like virus and following this I got what has now been diagnosed as M.E.. I was a diagnostic Radiographer by profession and worked for 6 years at Poole Hospital NHS Trust, Dorset. Poole Hospital is a busy District General Hospital. I had an excellent career. I enjoyed my work, the company of the people I worked with as well as working with the people that found themselves to be patients in need of care. I am now retired and have been forced through circumstance to give up my independence and to live with my parents because of the severity of my illness. I'm now 35 years old.

I run this online organisation with my co-editor Del Kennedy and the mailing list moderators - Laura Jones and John Breward. The services are provided for people who live with chronic M.E. as well as friends and relatives of those that share their lives with others who have chronic M.E..

And, when I'm able, I research the research now available to the general public in an attempt to try and find out what exactly is wrong with my health and the health of many thousands of others.

In the last two years, a significant volume of research from abroad has repeatedly uncovered various infective pathways that all seem to lead to a state of seemingly "unidentifiable" and chronic illness; illness that has been labelled with ignorance, arrogance and apparent disinterest, using the bland generic term of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. This term itself is deliberately patronising and misleading; Fatigue simply fails to outline the total systemic illness and debility that people repeatedly describe. These descriptions carry so much credibility because they are correlated by so many independent subjects from all over the world. These people are not collaborating or have any reason to collaborate their symptoms.

If we were for one second to believe the propaganda spread by Psychiatry, we would have to believe that all these sick and disabled individuals were manifesting their diseases as a figment of both their own and their collective imaginations. It's not the first time in medical history a genuine physical illness has been labelled as Mass Hysteria. Multiple Sclerosis itself was labelled with pretty much the same degree of ignorance and arrogance before "ground breaking" research eventually uncovered the truth behind the symptoms. When the discovery was made, M.S. then became a legitimate illness overnight - the patients weren't hysterical, they weren't suffering form any form of functional somatic somatic syndrome. To this day, insufficient research has prevented proper treatment, and the discovery of the underlying disease processes. The similarities with some variants of chronic M.E. do not end there.

This state of severe and debilitated poor health that has been described as Myalgic Encephalomyelitis can resemble the acuteness and chronicity of many other illnesses. A simple way to demonstrate this statement would be to compare and contrast the numbers of people with chronic M.E. who find themselves forced to apply for Disability Living Allowance. Look at their application forms - see what these people have to live with. Read the descriptions of chronic systemic illness. Compare them with the severity of illness that others with established and "legitimate" disabilities such as chronic Rheumatoid Arthritis (a cousin of at least one variant of chronic M.E.) have to live with from day to day. Note the low quality of life these people endure. Or, alternatively, investigate the escalating numbers of people who are forced to retire prematurely from successful careers due to a sudden and rapid decline in their health. Or, as a further example, look at the growing number of children who are forced away from their places of education and their first groups of friends - a life from which they have no detectable reason to want to leave.

These people with chronic, "unexplainable" illness are from all types of social strata; from the affluent to the poor, from children to the elderly. And, more alarmingly, the number of people finding themselves in this situation is rising steadily, day by day, year on year.

It has been repeatedly been proved beyond doubt that disease of known description can be caused by an assault on the immune system by a virus of previously unknown origin. It is already proved that an auto immune system disease can result from such an assault. It has been proven that such disease can cause debilitation, systemic dysfunction and/or disability.

It has been repeatedly demonstrated that bacterial infections can mount an assault on the immune system. The degree of assault is usually proportional to the state of health of the individual at the time of the infection. Degree of assault can also depend on predisposing inherited weaknesses that an individual may harbour. Degree of assault is dependent on many other factors; the health of the bodies' own immune system at the time of the infection is one key factor. Stress is another key. Stress alone has been seen to lower the immune system defences. This lowering of defence would provide an ideal opportunity for a significant assault on the immune system to take place. How much stress are we all under the influence of due to the pressures of work alone? Combine these factors and start to wonder what potential harm a human being can come to under certain circumstances......

This is a good point to mention chemical cocktails - an artificial and human cause of chronic debilitating systemic illness. Only recently it was demonstrated through experimental research that a 2 chemical combination alone, when ingested, can produce a combined effect of at least 1000% of the potency and toxicity of the individual chemical substances alone. These chemicals exist in everyday household products such as weed killer or hayfever products.. If we take prescribed medication, our bodies also have to deal with prescribed chemical cocktails on top of household chemical combinations.....

The Department of Health here in the UK recently issued a statement to a programme broadcast on BBC Radio 4 entitled "Costing the Earth". The programme described current research surrounding the dangers of common chemical cocktails on human health. The DoH statement states the following....

"The Department of Health recognises that it is possible for mixtures of chemicals to exert very much greater toxicity than would be expected from their individual toxic properties".

"There is no convincing evidence to such effects at low environmentally relevant exposures".

"We do not believe that the huge increase of animal testing that would be needed to cover testing of mixtures could be justified".

I would certainly suggest that the disease profile of Gulf War Syndrome alone would be considered the result of a "very rare" series of events. I would suggest that the relatively rare but increasing cases of Organophosphate poisoning, Multiple Chemical Sensitivity and some forms of chronic M.E. should also be taken into consideration when investigating the effects of chemical cocktails on human health. Open minded listening to the patients would be a good place to start

It would also be pertinent to point out that the reason why there is no "convincing" evidence is because there simply hasn't been enough research; as the statement itself admits. This is a "chicken and egg" situation. Without investigation there is no evidence, without enough evidence there is no will for more investigation. Surely, if there is a significant element of doubt, on moral grounds alone there should be a full investigation into the case of chemical cocktails and their effect on humans no matter how damaging this might be to the industries that produce such cocktails.

Despite the wall of silence from both USA and UK Governments as well as the smokescreen of denigration deployed by Psychiatry; Gulf War veterans are getting closer to finding out through foreign published research that the effects of their exposure to chemical pollution and vaccination cocktails are most real and physically tangible - as disabled veterans have been quite rightly protesting all along.

Yet again, Psychiatry prefers the method of denigration to maintain their stranglehold on an illness or disease that has absolutely nothing to do with them. Denigration of patients is a cheap and crude method of explanation in the face of the available physiological evidence that describes completely different disease or dysfunction processes.

What we are apparently seeing before our eyes is a creeping epidemic that for some time has been ignored or swept under the proverbial carpet.. And, we are facing the inability of both the Medical Profession and the State to accept that they are failing to address the situation as it relentlessly unfolds. Failure of medicine to act is a failure to obey the basic Hippocratic oath. The Government is failing in it's moral duty to care for sick, diseased and disabled members of society. Both Government and Medical Profession have failed before when, prior to the discovery of Multiple Sclerosis, many thousands of people who became suddenly and chronically ill were labelled as having Hysterical Paralyses.

When I contracted Campylobacteriosis (food poisoning) back in September 1995 it was followed two weeks later by an immune dysfunction that manifested itself as Reactive Arthritis. I had this arthritis in my lower limbs and pelvis. It spread initially from my left foot to my left hip and down to my right foot. It took three months to resolve enough to allow me to function with 90% normality. I have a marker of hlab27 positive that makes me 50% (information provided by ARC) more likely to pick up reactive arthritis as a result of a bacterial infection. I already have an inbuilt genetic weakness. Once established, this marker labelled me as having a predisposed weakness to Ankylosing Spondylitis alone. I know others with M.E. who also have this hlab27 positive marker. No one seems interested in investigating any association.

Why is it that the medical profession is institutionally unable to grasp the concept that evolving, destructive and mutating viri, bacteria and chemicals are all more than able to evoke modified immune system dysfunction or disease responses that could quite logically result in new and unique diseases - diseases that have their own individual profiles? It seems that instead of grasping the natural laws of evolution, the medical profession and society as a whole is dealing with the inevitable by the cheap and vulgar denigration of people who don't simply fit existing and established disease profiles.

So far I've uncovered research linking severe M.E. with a variant of Polio - Epstein Barr is a common precursor to M.E. as is Coxsackie B; these are direct variants of the original Polio Virus. Their effect has been termed as non-paralytic atypical Polio. The end result has been termed Atypical Post Polio Syndrome. I've found another solid link to Human Herpes Virus 6, which links the illness to non HIV Aid's as well as Multiple Sclerosis. Fourteen years ago, Melvin Ramsay himself put forward a case for HHV6 reactivation as a cause of ongoing disease process in chronic M.E.. His research has now been vindicated. Sadly, during his lifetime, his work was mostly ignored by the establishment. With the current evidence now available, it cannot be ignored anymore.

In Japan it has been demonstrated only recently that Borna Virus Nucleic Acid as been detected in people with the generically termed condition of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. To quote a statement from a very recent article, published in the USA by The Journal of Infectious Diseases:

"To the Editor - Czygan et al. reported the detection of Borna disease virus (BDV) nucleic acid in 3 cases of a rare form of hippocampal degeneration, whereas the brains of patients with other neuropsychiatric disorders tested negative for BDV. Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is another, more frequently diagnosed neuropsychiatric disease that is associated with BDV infection.

"However, the published findings are highly controversial. Nakaya et al. and Kitani et al. showed both BDV-specific antibodies and RNA in a high percentage of Japanese patients with CFS. Bode et al. isolated BDV from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) of an American patient with CFS; however, in an earlier publication, Bode et al., as well as Evengård et al. and Yamaguchi et al. in recent publications, did not find serologic evidence for BDV in patients with CFS. A possible explanation for the controversial results is that the term "chronic fatigue syndrome" probably includes several similar clinical conditions that may have different aetiologies".

Many people know that a flu like virus initiated their often rapid decline into poor health and a further decline into chronic M.E.. Surely it would be pertinent to suggest that with the available evidence now available to us all, a full investigation of viral interaction at cellular level be undertaken to demonstrate atypical disease profiles. It would seem obvious to postulate that the initial flu like virus symptoms are the automatic response of the immune system to the initial viral attack. Many other illnesses manifest themselves this way with initial flu like symptoms. Meningitis is just one example - Polio is another.

There are now tests in the private sector and abroad that can prove what's going on. MRI and SPECT scans show brain damage, blood cell examination reveals damage in people with Chronic M.E.. Other blood tests show HHV6 reactivation in many with chronic M.E.. only recently the Bora Virus has been identified in people with chronic M.E.. It just takes some effort to seek this research out. It all exists in Black and White.

Thankfully the Internet has given everyone access to this data. If the Government or the NHS are relying on the ignorance of the masses to drive their refusal to act on a growing health crisis, then they ought to start thinking again. Technology is giving the average well educated person the ability to research; as I have been doing here at home for the last three years. I'm not able to get to a library without the effort of doing so impacting adversely on my health. Technology is a perfect tool to circumvent this problem. Myself and many others are now able to seek out the full facts and we are also now able to make them available to others.

As people like us gather the relevant information, published by genuine and respected sources, and put it into a form that makes people wake up and take notice, it will become progressively more difficult over time for institutions of authority to ignore this growing body of evidence. They won't be able to ignore the growing numbers of people including disabled medical, paramedical and other related professionals who are now able to raise awareness collectively themselves.

Just one example of the type of research that blows the lid on the Psychiatrist's propaganda that Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is just a Functional Somatic Syndrome can be found at the HHV6 web site.

The problems in the UK are fundamental. We have a situation where the Government and the National Health Service are blind to this research. I feel that this blindness has been caused because the implications of such serious health issues would mean the need to restructure the health service to include research facilities and treatment centres for people struck down by all the various forms of Auto Immune Diseases and Dysfunction's. This of course would cost a great deal of money.

In addition, we also have a situation within medicine where doctors are scared to criticise each other's professional competence. Cross professional criticism is one of the major taboo's damaging patients within our society. You only have to look in this weeks national newspapers to see examples. Within the NHS, management has been openly seen to allow clinical malpractice to continue for years. Junior doctors fear criticising their senior colleagues because they need references from them for future career advancement. Doctors are rarely accountable for their actions or views. They rely on their professional friends and this ongoing taboo to protect them.

Surely this culture is dangerous. Patients have suffered and are still suffering because of it. Indeed, patients have died because of this common practice. The proof is now appearing, rather embarrassingly for those concerned, in the UK Press. Click here and here for just one example of such long term malpractice. How many more doctors are out there in other parts of the medical profession - getting away with inappropriate and dangerous practices?

What has this to do with the plight of people with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis you may ask?

Well, there is plenty of existing research evidence out in the public domain to throw bucketful's of doubt on the ideology and methodology for the current treatment of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome; especially with respect to the treatment of people with severe and unresolving M.E... Graded exercise and cognitive behavioural therapy have been repeatedly criticised because they have adverse effects on a sub group of severely effected individuals.

There are plenty of doctors out there who profess to an opposing or alternative view to existing treatment methodology. For some time now, all we've heard is one set of views in opposition to the other. We never hear any conclusion and we never hear open criticism or fundamental questioning. Doctors hate criticising each other. The BMA and the GMC are more like Masonic Institutions in this respect. Psychiatry only ever promotes it's own views and never includes opposing research in it's own published papers. All we see is the continual status quo - the perpetuation of a "no man's land" between the two opposing sides. The result of this impasse is the harm and mistreatment of the people who are chronically ill. Is this really good enough?

The constant "we don't know what M.E. is" is just not true - it's a statement used to dismiss alternative evidence. Despite the published research papers of respected agencies abroad there is still NO substantial epidemiological or virological research assistance from the United Kingdom. We have NO equivalent of the United States Centre For Disease Control. Any research of any substance here in the UK has almost exclusively endeavoured to pile the blame for patients' symptoms on to the shoulders of the patients themselves. As the severely affected are the least able to fight back - this has been the ideal weapon of choice for the State and the profession of Psychiatry to prevent any constructive progress. In the USA this is no longer the case. Through internal investigation the whole CFS situation is now in a process of review. Even the CDC is now twitching nervously because the current available evidence is making avoidance of the issues rather embarrassing.

The evolution of psychiatric intervention has born the term "Lifestyle Management" which is now used to illustrate the "ideal" and "only way" of coping with chronic M.E as well as mild "fatigue". As I have mentioned in previous articles, lifestyle implies choice and for many chronically ill people, choice is the one thing that just isn't on the table. I'd say to the Government and the National Health Service "How about addressing "Symptom Management" and the needs for investigative help for those with severe physiological problems"? I'd say to the medical profession "How about some specialist attention to neurological virological and immunological dysfunction"? "How about some useful research into pain control"? How about our medical profession refrain from the futile professional infighting that is most surely preventing any progress"? "How about quitting patronising us as patients and whilst we are at it, how about some basic human concern, respect and, how about some simple understanding"?

Then, when you've stopped and blinked to look at all the research that signpost's at least one form of chronic M.E. as just another example of a physiological, post viral, auto immune system disease, we'd like some tests, scans, investigations and clinical interest - sooner rather than later.

When ill as a child with arthritis I was sent for many tests and investigations. To have this sort of intervention I was transferred from a greatly respected Rheumatolgy Centre in Berkshire to a hospital of clinical excellence. Northwick Park Hospital in Middlesex had all the facilities at it's disposal to be able to carry out all the necessary tests, scans and biopsies. The hospital is still purpose built for disease research. To my knowledge there is no regional centre of sufficient calibre anywhere in the region I live in apart from Neurology at Southampton University Hospital. We do have the Wareham M.E. Clinic in south Dorset. As funds don't exist to turn Wareham Day Hospital from a cottage hospital into an International Centre of Excellence - it seem that the M.E. Clinic was fatally compromised from it's inception with regard to the treatment and investigation of the severely affected.

The M.E. Clinic - a charity based initiative, is about all we have to indicate "progress" along the path towards better treatment for people with "Chronic Fatigue Syndrome". This clinic as it stands is both remote from any centre that could provide clinical investigative services. It is also grossly under funded and is only available to patients living in Dorset itself or rather those that can actually physically manage to get to it.

The Wareham clinic does have it's uses. It has the ability to identify and refer on, conditions other than chronic M.E. Or, something a GP should possibly be competent at doing, even mild Post Illness Fatigue. The clinic can provide valuable help for people with mild post illness fatigue to allow them to recover from their symptoms. When the symptoms are mild they can be managed. We are talking about Mildly Fatigued individuals that, by and large, have near to normal and functioning lives in society. These people are only partially affected with symptoms that could not be described as severe. With the correct guidance they recover to lead normal lives. Many patients on the waiting lists are at work or at school - they never meet the 25% of severely affected people with chronic M.E. who remain housebound with debilitating symptoms.

In an ideal world we need at least one of these clinics in every county running on a full time basis. These clinics would provide an advisory, diagnostic and referral service for those relatively well enough to only be partially compromised - people who would be able to attend such a clinic. For those that are severely affected, we need regional centres of excellence with access to substantial health care including investigation, research and inpatient facilities. I would suggest that places of excellence including hospitals of the stature of Northwick Park in Harrow should be assigned to cater for the severely affected.

The systemic physiological symptoms such as joint and muscle pain, abdominal dysfunction, migraines, neurological problems, immunological dysfunction, cognitive dysfunction, profound weakness and other symptoms, all need addressing seriously and urgently because they matter so much to those that live with them and also to those that share their lives with someone who has Chronic M.E..

The chronically ill may be a minority, however, the needs of this minority are infinitely more acute than those needing Lifestyle Management. The major M.E. Charities have consistently failed to speak out for the needs of the severely affected in recent years. The plight of these people is the big issue that needs fundamental thought and priority.

When I had a back injury and subsequent rheumatic fever followed by juvenile arthritis as a child of 14 years, my symptoms were addressed, researched, treated and managed with respect and urgency. I ended up in hospital for a total of 12 months having physiotherapy, drug trials, biopsies, tests, investigations, scans - in short - I mattered to the NHS. It took 6 years before I recovered and returned to normal life with the help of the NHS. Subsequently, and with much study to catch up on my education, I ended up working for them.

Four years into my current illness, my day-to-day life carries symptoms that affect me far more adversely than my arthritis ever did. I feel systemically, physiologically ill. I don't have depression because I'm naturally optimistic. I have a loving family and friends that make an effort for me. My career in the NHS has nurtured my curiosity in public health issues.

The NHS has done nothing to help my current physical condition. In fact it's done a fair bit to make my condition as bad as it is today. When first diagnosed, I was put through 18 months of 'rehabilitation' and I had to drop out because even the journey alone in an NHS taxi, 4 journeys a week; in mostly rush hour traffic, for 30 miles each day, was making my illness worse. When my M.E. started I was told by a Rheumatologist and my GP to "stay at work, take the pain killers or else I'd probably lose my job".

I now face a wall of disinterest when I go to my General Practice Doctor. She has little or no knowledge of all the current and available research. The last time I visited she could only apologise. Frankly I'm lucky my GP isn't openly hostile as they very often can be to others with chronic M.E.. Many doctors refuse to believe that M.E. exists at all. Any information they do have has probably been supplied by Psychiatry who are now well known for withholding any research other than their own. Surely this is an unbalanced state of affairs? Surely doctors deserve to read the full facts? They need all the evidence to make a considered opinion.

Disinterest and lack of information can quite easily prevent diagnosis of other problems - as an example, Bowel Cancer. A case of this sort of misdiagnosis in a male adult was publicised a year or two ago - he had been told that he had "just got Irritable Bowel Syndrome" - the interest was severed at that point until of course his cancer got critical and intervention could only then be palliative.

Only last month a man with advancing throat cancer got into the news because he had seen a doctor 22 times; was repeatedly told to "get a life" by casualty doctors, specialists and GP's before, on the 23rd occasion, he was diagnosed with (by then) inoperable throat cancer. With this sort of closed, dismissive, medical incompetence at work is it no wonder that people with chronic M.E. have very little chance of ever getting the treatment or investigations they need?

No doubt, when I see my specialist I'll have the same response as others with chronic M.E. have had when they rarely get to see theirs. The doctor will probably say there's nothing they can do and will dismiss investigation as they do without concern for many, many others. They see M.E. on the referral letter, have no knowledge of all the possible problems and turn people away without conscience. To demonstrate I shall most certainly be updating this web site with the result of my outpatient appointment when it arrives in late June.

This institutional disinterest is blatantly a form of medical apartheid, fuelled partly by belief and lack of information. . In our modern caring and politically correct society, is that really good enough?

I have 3 disabled friends (Spina Biffida, Rheumatoid Arthritis and Cerebral Palsy) that I originally met when I returned to school aged 15 after my first bout of illness. These friends, for the greater part of the last 4 years have all been working and leading relatively normal lives. They get Disability Living Allowance without a problem.

My illness and symptoms cause my disability so I don't look disabled. Is this differential diagnosis of simplistic observation in itself, a form of Disability Discrimination? It seems that now, as I'm finding out with a DLA Appeal on the cards, to qualify for any Disability Benefits today you have to be physically disfigured to qualify as disabled - such narrow minded ignorance should not be allowed to be acceptable in such an advanced and caring society.

In any case, obviously disabled or not, I feel very ill most of the time - enough to force me to be mostly housebound and for a lot of the time forced to take to my bed as you would do if you had severe Flu That's how I feel seven days a week. I'm better off than others. Physical weakness is about 5th or 6th on my list of symptoms. Above that I have constant joint and muscle pain that are as severe as the pain of arthritis with other constant symptoms such as hot and cold fever, migranous headaches, extreme food intolerance, constant sore throat's Gastrointestinal dysfunction and many other problems including intermittent but mild "brain fog" that do vary in small degrees but not ever to an extent where I feel well enough to function in society; a society that I'd embrace if these symptoms didn't keep knocking me down. My physical symptoms have tried their best to put my life on hold yet I still try to be sociable and I still try my best to get out into the clean fresh air of a summers afternoon. One of my aims is to get back to my hobby of cycletouring - I was once a very fit athlete - until I was taken ill.

There are many others with even more serious and chronic M.E. who would say that I am relatively lucky.

Many of us are now second class citizens who face a wall of disinterest from our doctors. We then face further brick walls if we ever reach a specialist. For the greater part they don't care and don't want to know unless you just happen to find someone in that monolithic organisation that understands. Even then there is little else they can do because they face their own brick walls in the form of a disbelieving and uncaring piers. I enclose evidence of this to demonstrate the argument.

Today, the distortion of the available evidence, the changing of the goal posts, to include anything that could be called Chronic Fatigue has divisively defocused the major issues and muddied the waters. Psychiatry has denigrated anyone that has a chronic and physically debilitating illness - purely because they refuse to acknowledge the positive research by other professions. This is little more than manipulation of the available facts. Who is out there on the side of the patient to keep checks on such a potentially dangerous practice?

This body of evidence, demonstrating many organic mechanisms at the heart of chronic systemic illness will eventually become too large to ignore. The Centre for Disease Control in the USA is changing it's attitudes to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. A full reassessment of the state of progress is now underway. Surely the same reassessment should be demanded to investigate the state of affairs here in the United Kingdom. This is an ideal opportunity to get the focus back and the main issue of chronic systemic physiological illness into the public domain.

If Chronic M.E.- chronic and systemic illness (and the issues exclusive to it) was allowed to have it's own voice as it once did then it would almost certainly secure more credibility and more focus of attention. The public still doesn't know what a chronic systemic illness chronic M.E. is. They still think it's "feeling a little bit tired in the afternoon" or "all in the mind" some still use the tag "Yuppie Flu" and that's despite and in spite of what mixed publicity has already gone before. Very little thanks go to either Action for M.E. or the M.E. Association although there are members like myself who make efforts to spread awareness. Thanks should most certainly go to them. Sadly we find ourselves a minority within both organisations.

The community of the chronically ill and disabled deserve far far better than the current situation. What has happened in the last 20 years to reduce the NHS to a state of `running to stand still`? Last winter the NHS lost 20,000 people in a flu crisis. It wasn't even a pandemic or an epidemic. Fit and able men of my age (35) died because of the impotence of the NHS. They are now so weak as a functioning organisation they can't even manage to act proactively for something as common place as Influenza. What hope do we have that they can face the new diseases that we are facing today. Nature will not stop it's progress. Evolution will not stop creating new viri and bacteria. Industrial Science will not stop creating new and damaging chemical cocktails that are of real and potential harm to the general public.

This is an ongoing fight for the truth. It's a fight for legitimacy - a fight to gain respect and a fight for the treatment that is so blatantly being refused and so desperately needed.

The substantial body evidence in our defence is growing every week now; technology is making it available to the masses - circumventing the inactivity of the charities who are consistently failing to fight effectively on our behalf. It really is just a matter of time before the demands for fundamental change are accepted and addressed. When they are, will we get an apology? I sadly think not.

When the establishment is forced to act, it will be action that's been overdue for many years..