Radiation and CFS....is there a valid connection?

[beachlover1957]

The current problems in Japan have made me seriously consider the possible role for radioactivity in CFS. The NCF had identified two papers that directly linked low level radiation exposure via exact mitochondrial DNA deletions. These papers can be found at http://www.ncf-net.org/library/PressRelease100820AddInfo.htm and in particular, items labelled as #1 and #2. Personally, I've been ill for close to thirty years and have seen HTLV-II, EBV, HHV-6, mycoplasmas, chlamydia, and a host of other
things come and go but this radiation stuff really has me wondering. With all the nuke power plants, depleted uranium munitions used by our DOD, DOD superfund sites and now with the Japanese dumping radioactive stuff into the sea....could our disease be connected to all this environmental crap? Have we polluted ourselves and this is the result and now we are paying the Piper? These papers certainly make me wonder. There have been other papers showing, for example, Chernobyl clean-up crews coming down with CFS. If this is all true, then there would be an established link, backed by relevent science, for radiation to play a role in the development of CFS at least for some patients. Perhaps this is one such identified subgroup? Does anyone else wonder about all this stuff?

-Beach

 

[glenp]

Yes - I have often wondered if the numerous exrays that I have had have contributed to this illness. Us older ones used to have foot exrays when we bought shoes- - we often stayed and played exraying our feet. Soooooo many things i wonder about

glen

 

[fla]

The way I see it our bodies are trapped in a vicious circle and there are multiple entry points into the vicious circle. Radiation and the resulting mitochondrial damage is most likely one of those entry points but probably not the most common entry point for most of us.

 

[Carrigon]

I know radiation plays a role. But it's from the source closest to us, the microwave oven. The Dutch and Russian studies all said it causes a CFS like disease, they weren't wrong.

 

[taniaaust1]

If mitochrondrial issues are the cause of our illness.. maybe a subgroup of us are due to radiation.

Many of us get MCS with the CFS but there is a group of CFSers who get EMS (electromagnetic sensitivity) so this illness probably prediposes one to issues with radiation

 

[Snow Leopard]

I know radiation plays a role. But it's from the source closest to us, the microwave oven. The Dutch and Russian studies all said it causes a CFS like disease, they weren't wrong.

But microwave radiation isn't ionizing. It's apples and oranges..

 

[fla]

Non ionizing radiation has already been shown to affect the brain. Those effects are unclear at the moment.

"The editorial authors also question whether the findings of Volkow et al may be a marker of other alterations in brain function from radiofrequency emissions, such as neurotransmitter and neurochemical activities? "If so, this might have effects on other organs, leading to unwanted physiological responses."

 

[fla]

This other thread brought up a very interesting paper that shows a disturbance of the immune system with electromagnetic field exposure. For a neuro-immune disease like ME/CFS for which the cause is poorly understood, finding that non-ionizing radiation can affect both the brain and the immune system should warrant further investigation.