MS unheard of

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Lyon
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MS unheard of

Post by Lyon »

We hear that there are places in the world where MS is rare/nonexistant.....but in life we hear a lot of things that we don't know whether or not to believe.

I thought this, thankfully naive, question to a Malaysian newspaper made it a little more real http://thestar.com.my/health/story.asp? ... sec=health
I HAVE heard a lot about multiple sclerosis from my friends in America. Their relatives have been afflicted, it seems. But I have yet to hear of anyone in Malaysia who has it. Is it a common disease?
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scorpion
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Post by scorpion »

This is truly amazing. Why are there areas in the world that are not effected by MS??? UGGGHHH if someone could just figure out that answer!!! More Vitamin D??? Genes??? I guess only with more research will we find the answer!!!
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Post by Lyon »

That's exactly why I posted it scorp! Frustration factor!

Of course we need to continue on in other ways and try to find effective therapies and understand MS any way that we can, but we always need to be mindful of the basics because that's where the only strong clues for MS incidence lie.

This thing actually could be a field of science in itself in that it's not just MS but a host of diseases that were unknown to our great grandparents but we in the "developed" world experience in high numbers.

MS itself doesn't specifically affect a huge number, but if you add up all of the diseases which began an alarming increase of incidence after the beginning of the 20th century it might be easier to determine the cause...or at least finding the cause(s) would be taken more seriously. Autism, allergies, asthma, the inflammatory/autoimmune diseases, multiple cancers were either rare or non existent per capita in the developed countries before they became developed and are still rare/non existent per capita in populations which remain undeveloped.

HUGE clue, which so far hasn't paid off :cry:
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Just_Me
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Post by Just_Me »

I don't believe that there is any part of the world that doesn't have a certain disease - maybe just a genetically less common with some people.
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Post by LR1234 »

genetics....maybe the people in those areas are just not susceptible to getting MS because of their genepool. I am sure if they started having children with those who are suscpetible from Canada/Scotland UK etc some of the children in Malaysia would start to be affected. I don't think its about the climate change that increases or decreases the risk...I think its probably about the triggers in those countries. i.e how common is EBV in Malaysia?
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cheerleader
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Post by cheerleader »

In Bologna, Dr. B.B. Lee stated that congenital truncular venous malformations- the kind seen by Drs. Zamboni and Dake- are found in the Caucasian populations- very rare in Asians or Africans.
cheer
Husband dx RRMS 3/07
dx dual jugular vein stenosis (CCSVI) 4/09
http://ccsviinms.blogspot.com
Lyon
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Post by Lyon »

Just_Me wrote:I don't believe that there is any part of the world that doesn't have a certain disease - maybe just a genetically less common with some people.
Sorry! I knew better than to write "non existant" and I should have used "so rare as to seem non existant".

Hard to prove one way or the other with certainty but it seems that MS has always been around in isolated instances and extremely rarely in undeveloped populations.

Makes an infectious cause seem pretty far fetched and that's just one facet of what makes MS incidence seem mystical because in other ways it seems almost certain that infectious causes are a factor of incidence??
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Just_Me
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Post by Just_Me »

I believe many of our diseases are caused by things we do. What we eat or are exposed to - and not necessarily bad things but who knows, maybe people with MS are actually all allergic to some common plant or scent or food?

Also human bodies are screwed up. What our bodies do to protect us from one thing causes another problem. For example, I read somewhere that people with Sickle Cell Disease (more common in black persons) are immune or more resistant to malaria (very common in Africa).
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Post by Lyon »

Just_Me wrote:I believe many of our diseases are caused by things we do. What we eat or are exposed to
So true. I think anyone interested in any kind of medical research should first be familiar with the history of the search for the causes of what we would later find were the vitamin deficiency diseases.

For hundreds of years researchers unsuccessfully searched for the causes and became convinced it was beyond human understanding. Fate, luck and a little skill finally provided the answers, which in reality were as simple as getting the needed nutrients. Not to say that the cause of MS is vitamin deficiency but the cause of MS probably is something under the radar and ridiculously simple.
Just_Me wrote: Also human bodies are screwed up. What our bodies do to protect us from one thing causes another problem. For example, I read somewhere that people with Sickle Cell Disease (more common in black persons) are immune or more resistant to malaria (very common in Africa).
I have to agree. A lot of us feel that the loss of exposure to things that caused much death and disease in the past is what led to all these "modern" diseases, which is pretty much what you're hinting. We human (animals) are damned if we do and damned if we don't. Name your poison because something's going to get you either way.
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Just_Me
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Post by Just_Me »

Lyon wrote:I have to agree. A lot of us feel that the loss of exposure to things that caused much death and disease in the past is what led to all these "modern" diseases, which is pretty much what you're hinting. We human (animals) are damned if we do and damned if we don't. Name your poison because something's going to get you either way.
Definately. I don't want to start the vaccine-arguement but one example is the increase in Shingles & its hitting younger people...and that is due to the Chicken Pox vaccine. Not directly related but we don't get exposed to CP anymore so we don't get little "booster shots" we used to get.

I'm not saying vaccines should be eliminated but that I do believe its all related somehow.
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Post by Lyon »

Absolutely. Not that we should only consider that we got the better end of the trade and ignore the existence of autoimmune disease, but in the late 19th century, even though autoimmune diseases were unheard of in America at the time, a much higher percentage of people died in childhood of infectious diseases.

Years ago I was working on the genweb cemetery transcription project and it was really sad the read the story of the headstones. Child after child died in a given family and additionally mothers often died due to complication during childbirth or afterwords due to infection.

I suppose if MS incidence is ever proven to be due to the loss of evolutionary normal conditions, at that point we would have to consider that 250,000 - 400,000 in the US currently have been diagnosed with MS where millions and millions otherwise wouldn't have even made it to adulthood due to childhood illnesses, and that sucks about as bad as MS.
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Post by AMO »

Believe me MS is everywhere... if you read all the facts its not about a specific region anymore. We're all fighting the fight.
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Post by Lyon »

AMO wrote:Believe me MS is everywhere... if you read all the facts its not about a specific region anymore. We're all fighting the fight.
MS remains rare in the undeveloped populations of the world, but as the wealth spreads, so does MS http://www.neurology.org/cgi/content/abstract/71/2/129
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