Radiation Model for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Announced by the National CFIDS Foundation 2019

Trish said:
Have you seen any credible evidence to support the idea, @rachel76?
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Not much and what there is is circumstantionial but here it is:

A paper saying that bystander effect in radiation is more complex then previously thought. I assume it means you don't have to be living near a nuclear facility or in a fallout to get this.
http://www.ncf-net.org/library/MothersillLowDoseHyperSensRIBE.pdf

Some similarities between symptoms of severe CFS and Chronic Radiation Syndrome - CRS. CRS is a condition that was only recognized in the former Soviet Union.
Most of the research on the effect of nuclear fallout was done by either by the Soviets or the Americans after the cold war. The Americans came to the conclusion that excessive radiation exposure can only cause cancer and birth defects while the Soviets came up with a condition called Chronic Radiation Syndrome -CRS, where someone can can sick on smaller doses of radiation exposed over a longer period of time. In CRS no two people have the same symptoms.

The symptoms of Case 6 under "Case studies" sound familiar.
http://www.ncf-net.org/radiation/An...essCasesInThePopulationOfTheSouthernUrals.pdf

Then there are the facts that:
-The higher incidence of Lymphoma in CFS,

-CFS and cancer related fatigue are similar and have already been compared in this paper
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23182646

- Lupus rates and autoimmune diseases rates go up around nuclear facilities.

-The large number of Gulf War Veterans diagnosed with "Fibromyalgia" or "CFS" and the similarity in symptoms of Gulf War Syndrome to CFS. Depleted Uranium was used in the Gulf War.

-https://www.newsweek.com/mysterious-kazakhstan-sleeping-sickness-could-spread-311324
 
rachel76 said:
alpha particles according to the CFIDS Foundation
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Alpha particles are stopped by a piece of paper or a few centimeters of air. To do damage you need to ingest something radioactive and have it taken up by your body. I would have thought that would mean there should be a strong association of ME with cancer which I don't think there is.
 
rachel76 said:
Alpha particles.

My Mum had treatment with radiotherapy for a growth when she was a girl. All the rest of my family who didn't have radiotherapy as a kid have healthy kids and decendants. Not only that, but there seems to be a higher incidence of autoimmune diseases around Hanford nuclear facility.
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Don't Alpha particles have to be ingested or inhaled to be dangerous?
 
@BruceInOz

The CFIDS Foundation says that it is from ingesting. They say it can occur through the air but most likely through drinking water.

There is an association of ME with cancer. I don't know if it is strong association or not. I found it in the links below.

Also there is a small subset of people with ME who say they got better on Rituximab, a cancer drug.

https://www.reliasmedia.com/article...lymphoma-in-chronic-fatigue-syndrome-patients
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3434293/
http://www.meresearch.org.uk/mecfs-and-cancer/
 
TigerLilea said:
Don't Alpha particles have to be ingested or inhaled to be dangerous?
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I read in the last CFIDS Foundation newsletter that they think research points to ingested or inhaled alpha particles causing CFS.

My Mum had a non cancerous growth either in or near the mouth as a child. In the early 1950's they gave her radiotherapy for it. My Mum is now 76. So I occasionally wonder if my CFS is from that.
 
So you don't feel that any possible association of ME with a higher incidence of some cancers may be a result of possible immune system behaviour alterations caused by ME? As the immune system is, according to my understanding, one of the primary mechanisms for preventing cancers.

Or even that cells that are 'malfunctioning', using less efficient pathways, generating and not dealing with toxins as efficiently as they should may be slightly more likely to become cancerous?

There are presumably many ways that cancer can be caused that don't involve radiation, and as far as I know most cancers aren't caused by radiation. As far as I know most cancers are attributed to toxins, of various types, causing cellular machinery to malfunction.

If a few centimeters of air can block alpha particles (reduce the energy of them until they pose no risk) then what effect do you think water has?

ETA - the symptoms described in 'case 6' do not sound like ME to me. If they match your symptoms then I would strongly advise you to seek medical advice.
 
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Yes It could be the result of possible immune system behaviour alterations caused by ME.

I don't know enough about the subject.

I read that alpha particles are used in "Targeting alpha particle therapy" where in cancer alpha particles are injected in a tumour because they will destroy that tumour without penetrating into the rest of the body.
If injected alpha particles can penetrate enough to get into a tumour and destroy it, could they also damage a healthy body or mitochondria

To be honest I know nothing and am not sure of this theory. I just collate articles that are scattered around the web and put them together in one place. Would love to hear from someone properly educated on the subject. I might be totally wrong.

Also the similarity of symptoms between CRS and ME is not enough to say they are similar or have the same cause.
 
The symptoms described in 'case 6' do not sound like ME to me. If they match your symptoms then I would strongly advise you to seek medical advice.
 
Don’t believe everything you read. People get crazy ideas sometimes. You’d think that if there was a leak in radiation from x-ray departments, you’d have a higher prevalence of sick radio-technicians and there is not. In fact at the radiation department at the cancer hospital, technicians and radiologists wear a device that measures the radiation levels and it would alarm if the levels were concerning.

We do know that radiation is not good for you, but there is nothing to be alarmed unless you live near Fukushima or Chernobyl.
 
rachel76 said:
I read in the last CFIDS Foundation newsletter that they think research points to ingested or inhaled alpha particles causing CFS.

My Mum had a non cancerous growth either in or near the mouth as a child. In the early 1950's they gave her radiotherapy for it. My Mum is now 76. So I occasionally wonder if my CFS is from that.
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it’s worth thinking about all the other events that happened to your mum (and you) since since 1950ish though. Air pollution (which contained some really horrible stuff back then), viruses, bacteria, antibiotics, medications, cleaning products, mould, UV exposure and thousands more. That’s on top of what you might be more predisposed to because of genetics, gut microbiome, etc. None of these things are probably responsible for your ME/CFS (Other than the virus that came right before you got it) but it’s worth thinking about how much our bodies go through every second of the day and how hard it is to pin something to one life event without any robust evidence to back it up.

It’s natural to want to work out the why and how and your mums cancer and treatment is a huge life event so it’s no wonder you think about it. It’s just always good to try and sit back and put stuff in perspective sometimes.
 
rachel76 said:
Would love to hear from someone properly educated on the subject. I might be totally wrong.
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I am supposed to be properly educated about this, as a professor of medicine and immunology who worked on the role of mutation in immune disease.

The radiation theory looks to be a non-starter to me. All the suggestive connections fall apart on inspection of detail. For a start the epidemiology is wrong.
 
Not that I think this is involved in ME, but there are hospital-based devices that employ "teletherapy," i.e...
"The use of radioactive material, such as cobalt-60, for production of an external beam of gamma rays for treatment at a distance from the radioactive source" https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/teletherapy
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The devices are safe so long as the shielding is not removed. About six years ago, thieves in Mexico stole a truck containing such a device. They apparently were only after the truck. Fortunately, the intact machine was discovered with the abandoned truck.

Following 9/11, security protocols on such machines were tightened in the U.S. (and no doubt in many other countries, too).

I'm not sure where radioactive tracers for things like nuclear treadmill tests are produced, but I have assumed that, due to their short half-life, they probably come from nearby hospital radiology/nuclear medicine labs.

I just mention this to point out that, though x-ray machines do not use radioactive materials, there are such materials in some hospitals.
 
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