British MPs and members of the House of Lords are being invited to meet leading ME researchers at their main office block in Westminster on Thursday, 19 May.
Mrs Annette Whittemore and Dr Judy Mikovits, president and research director of the Whittemore Peterson Institute in Reno, Nevada, have accepted invitations to speak to the MPs in the Grimond Room at Portcullis House at 10.30am.
The invitations have come from the acting chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on ME, Annette Brooke MP, who says: “The WPI have been involved in the research which has shown a possible link between a new human retrovirus (XMRV) and ME, and this would be a useful opportunity for members of the APPG to hear about the implications of the research.”
The meeting will be limited to MPs, who are asked to contact the APPG Secretariat if they would like to attend.
Mrs Whittemore and Dr Mikovits will be in London to speak at the annual Invest in ME conference, Birdcage Walk, the following day (May 20). On May 22, Dr Mikovits will be at the Holiday Inn in Belfast at a meeting organised by the Newry and Mourne ME Support Group.
13 May 2011: We now understand that the invitation to this meeting at Portcullis House was as the result of an initiative from Invest in ME, whose annual international conference will be held at 1 Birdcage Walk, Westminster on May 20. Other researchers attending the conference are also expected at the meeting.
Excellent!
And they will no doubt tell our MP’s of the compelling evidence contained in the Lombardi et al 2011 paper “Xenotropic Murine Leukemia Virus-related Virus-associated Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Reveals a Distinct Inflammatory Signature”.
It will be interesting to see just how urgently and positively the APPG react to the seriousness of the message that they are presented with.
The MEA should report this:
Xenotropic Murine Leukemia Virus-related Virus-associated Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Reveals a Distinct Inflammatory Signature
Published IN VIVO
VINCENT C. LOMBARDI, KATHRYN S. HAGEN, KENNETH W. HUNTER, JOHN W. DIAMOND, JULIE SMITH-GAGEN, WEI YANG and JUDY A. MIKOVITS
Abstract. Background: The recent identification of xenotropic
murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) in the blood of
patients with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) establishes that a
retrovirus may play a role in the pathology in this disease.
Knowledge of the immune response might lead to a better
understanding of the role XMRV plays in this syndrome. Our
objective was to investigate the cytokine and chemokine
response in XMRV-associated CFS. Materials and Methods:
Using Luminex multi-analyte profiling technology, we
measured cytokine and chemokine values in the plasma of
XMRV-infected CFS patients and compared these data to those
of healthy controls. Analysis was performed using the Gene
Expression Pattern Analysis Suite and the Random Forest tree
classification algorithm. Results: This study identifies a
signature of 10 cytokines and chemokines which correctly
identifies XMRV/CFS patients with 93% specificity and 96%
sensitivity. Conclusion: These data show, for the first time, an
immunological pattern associated with XMRV/CFS.
http://www.cfscentral.com/2011/05/judy-mikovits-new-study.html
Yes, this is an important study and should be taken very seriously by the medical establishment…….. but they probably won’t.
The paper is published in the Journal “In Vivo” and an abstract can be viewed here: http://iv.iiarjournals.org/content/25/3/307.abstract
Data from the paper:
Patients Controls
Up-regulated
IL-8 1045 (254) 13 (1.6)
MIP-1β 1985 (556) 164 (41)
MIP-1α 763 (216) 91 (19)
TNF-α 148 (53) 13 (4.3)
IL-6 336 (87) 29 (11)
IL-2 113 (56) 28 (10)
IP-10 98 (16) 32.8 (3.0)
Eotaxin 271 (19) 95.8 (6.5)
IL-12 289 (20) 211 (31)
MCP-1 468 (42) 421 (41)
Rantes 27107 (3400) 9564 (1012)
Down-regulated
IL-13 28.2 (3.6) 85.5 (6.5)
IL-5 7.35 (0.66) 21.1 (4.9)
IL-7 33 (11) 78 (6.9)
MIG 48.2 (9.0) 80 (12)
IFN-α 35 5.9) 60 (4.3)
IL-1RA 1010 (363) 1277 (429)
GM-CSF 108 (23) 166 (28)
Is the MEA going to post about this new WPI paper?
The published item it here
http://iv.iiarjournals.org/content/25/3/307.abstract?etoc
@JT I’ll put up that In Vivo paper in a few minutes, or at least the abstract and a weblink