Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is one of a few diseases that not only “frustrates” those with CFS, but those without it as well; however, recent findings of a new retrovirus found in many CFS patients , may lead to new medical findings relating to CFS. This is important because until now there has been controversy over the etiology, diagnosis, and treatment of CFS.
CFS has been given a title as a “wastebasket diagnosis” because the symptoms of CFS have such a huge range. It was recently thought that about 17 million people may be suffering from CFS, but this was before there was a specific virus to test for. Now doctors may start looking for a xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus, or a type of gammaretrovirus, in patients thought to have CFS. The one responsible for this finding was Ila Signh, an associate professor of pathology at the University of Utah. This was because prostate cancer and CFS both change RNase L, an antiviral enzyme. After doing biological tests for this virus in 100 CFS patients, it was found that two thirds of the patients had this virus.
After further studies have shown that CFS can be transmitted through blood, breast feeding, and other related means. The link in this virus which infects healthy cells to that of prostate cancer and CFS, has shown that CFS is “not linked to a genetic mutation.” The relation between the XMRV however, remains a mystery to doctors. However, treatments on animal model tests are starting soon with reverse transcriptase inhibitors (“antiretroviral drug used to treat HIV infection, tumors[1], and cancer. RTIs inhibit activity of reverse transcriptase, a viral DNA polymerase enzyme that retroviruses need to reproduce.”)
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