Thank you for posting this Rrrr. Out of interest, was the NIH doing a study of XMRV in the blood supply and are yet to show their results?
As a reminder, look at the transcript of the teleconference on 8/23 (I am pretty sure that "Dr. Indecipherable" was Larry Alter, but haven't listened through to confirm)
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=432527206796
Dr McClusky: "Question regarding the blood safety. As you know there is no demonstration yet of the transfusion association of this virus and also not with disease yet. However that does not mean that we are not doing anything. FDA regulations require that donors be in good health at the time of donation. In addition the AABB, the umbrella group which is the blood establishment group has put up a statement, a recommendation which is self-deferral by history of CFS, which is "consistent with FDA requirements that donors should be in good health". So in other words blood safety is (maintained?)."
Dr (indecipherable): "We have in process a study of about 1000 donors looking for virus and AB. Those data will be available very soon. And we also have frozen samples that were prospectively collected from blood recipients before and after their transfusion and we have linked donors to those cases so we will be looking at those samples to see if we demonstrate any transmission or linkage from donor to recipient."
Now, what was finally published on 8/23/2010 was a little study that was completed in MAY or sooner, originally due to be published in June, and then the kerfuffle which we all know so well - and a time delay that Alter, Lo et.al. wisely used to lay any suspicion of contamination to rest. Notwithstanding this additional work being done on the PNAS paper, this other large scale work on the blood supply, I imagine, has been continuing all this time.
They *may* have something to tell us next week. Which would be awfully exciting. Even if those particular results aren't released yet, though, this is more and more indication that this subject is being taken VERY SERIOUSLY at the highest levels.
Can.Not.Wait. for next Tuesday and Wednesday!!!
p.s. we pronounce it "En Eye Aitch," sorry Python fans :sofa:
