From: "Rich Gauszka" 

Just stay away from anyone sprouting colored fibers. Joking aside that's
one starnge infection

"Robert Comer"  wrote in
message news:4464e382{at}w3.nls.net...
> And here I'm going to Corpus Christi the on Saturday the 20'th.  (That's
> in South Texas)   Bummer.
>
> --
> Bob Comer
>
>
> "Rich Gauszka"  wrote in message
> news:4464d7d5{at}w3.nls.net...
>> Black tarry sweat, strange colored fibers popping out of your skin and
>> it's not a science fiction movie.
>>
>> http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA051106.morgellans.KENS.32
030524.html
>>
>> Doctors puzzled over bizarre infection surfacing in South Texas
>>
>> Web Posted: 05/12/2006 10:51 AM CDT
>>
>> Deborah Knapp
>> KENS 5 Eyewitness News
>>
>>
>>
>> If diseases like AIDS and bird flu scare you, wait until you hear what's
>> next. Doctors are trying to find out what is causing a bizarre and
>> mysterious infection that's surfaced in South Texas.
>>
>> Morgellons disease is not yet known to kill, but if you were to get it,
>> you might wish you were dead, as the symptoms are horrible.
>>
>> "These people will have like beads of sweat but it's black, black and
>> tarry," said Ginger Savely, a nurse practioner in Austin who treats a
>> majority of these patients.
>>
>> Patients get lesions that never heal.
>>
>> "Sometimes little black specks that come out of the lesions
and sometimes
>> little fibers," said Stephanie Bailey, Morgellons patient.
>>
>> Patients say that's the worst symptom - strange fibers that pop out of
>> your skin in different colors.
>>
>> "He'd have attacks and fibers would come out of his hands and fingers,
>> white, black and sometimes red. Very, very painful," said Lisa Wilson,
>> whose son Travis had Morgellon's disease.
>>
>> While all of this is going on, it feels like bugs are crawling under your
>> skin. So far more than 100 cases of Morgellons disease have been reported
>> in South Texas.
>>
>> "It really has the makings of a horror movie in every
way," Savely said.
>>
>> While Savely sees this as a legitimate disease, there are many doctors
>> who simply refuse to acknowledge it exists, because of the bizarre
>> symptoms patients are diagnosed as delusional.
>>
>> "Believe me, if I just randomly saw one of these patients in
my office, I
>> would think they were crazy too," Savely said. "But
after you've heard
>> the story of over 100 (patients) and they're all - down to the most
>> minute detail - saying the exact same thing, that becomes quite
>> impressive."
>>
>> Travis Wilson developed Morgellons just over a year ago. He called his
>> mother in to see a fiber coming out of a lesion.
>>
>> "It looked like a piece of spaghetti was sticking out about a
quarter to
>> an eighth of an inch long and it was sticking out of his chest," Lisa
>> Wilson said. "I tried to pull it as hard as I could out and I could not
>> pull it out."
>>
>> The Wilson's spent $14,000 after insurance last year on doctors and
>> medicine.
>>
>> "Most of them are antibiotics. He was on Tamadone for pain. Viltricide,
>> this was an anti-parasitic. This was to try and protect his skin because
>> of all the lesions and stuff," Lisa said.
>>
>> However, nothing worked, and 23-year-old Travis could no longer take it.
>>
>> "I knew he was going to kill himself, and there was nothing I
could do to
>> stop him," Lisa Wilson said.
>>
>> Just two weeks ago, Travis took his life.
>>
>> Stephanie Bailey developed the lesions four-and-a-half years ago.
>>
>> "The lesions come up, and then these fuzzy things like spores
come out,"
>> she said.
>>
>> She also has the crawling sensation.
>>
>> "You just want to get it out of you," Bailey said.
>>
>> She has no idea what caused the disease, and nothing has worked to clear
>> it up.
>>
>> "They (doctors) told me I was just doing this to myself, that
I was nuts.
>> So basically I stopped going to doctors because I was afraid they were
>> going to lock me up," Bailey said.
>>
>> Harriett Bishop has battled Morgellons for 12 years. After a year on
>> antibiotics, her hands have nearly cleared up. On the day, we visited her
>> she only had one lesion and she extracted this fiber from it.
>>
>> "You want to get these things out to relieve the pain, and
that's why you
>> pull and then you can see the fibers there, and the tentacles are there,
>> and there are millions of them," Bishop said.
>>
>> So far, pathologists have failed to find any infection in the fibers
>> pulled from lesions.
>>
>> "Clearly something is physically happening here," said
Dr. Randy Wymore,
>> a researcher at the Morgellons Research Foundation at Oklahoma State
>> University's Center for Health Sciences.
>>
>> Wymore examines the fibers, scabs and other samples from Morgellon's
>> patients to try and find the disease's cause.
>>
>> "These fibers don't look like common environmental
fibers," he said.
>>
>> The goal at OSU is to scientifically find out what is going on. Until
>> then, patients and doctors struggle with this mysterious and bizarre
>> infection. Thus far, the only treatment that has showed some success is
>> an antibiotic.
>>
>> "It sounds a little like a parasite, like a fungal infection, like a
>> bacterial infection, but it never quite fits all the criteria of any
>> known pathogen," Savely said
>>
>> No one knows how Morgellans is contracted, but it does not appear to be
>> contagious. The states with the highest number of cases are Texas,
>> California and Florida.
>>
>>
>
>

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