[troutman]

Update on Desiree Jennings:

http://www.theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=1195

I have been blogging this week about the Desiree Jennings case – the 25 year old woman who is telling the media that she developed a neurological disorder known as dystonia two weeks following a seasonal flu vaccine. However, the video of her movement disorder that was made public was not, in fact, consistent with the diagnosis of dystonia or any organic movement disorder, and therefore it is highly unlikely that her symptoms were a vaccine reaction. Every movement disorder specialist or neurologist who viewed the videos and voiced their opinion agreed that the signs she was displaying on the public video were most consistent with a psychogenic movement disorder.

We were also careful to point out that this does not mean she is “faking”, that her symptoms are not real, and that she is not suffering from a genuine and debilitating disorder. Simply that the nature of the disorder is likely psychogenic and not due to any specific brain pathology, caused by a vaccine or anything else.

This is likely to go down as one of those cases that will forever divide the scientific community from the anti-vaccine community. They have clearly made up their minds, and their hostility and conspiracy-mongering toward other opinions is evident. While I just want to know the truth – let’s see all the evidence and let the chips fall where they may. Meanwhile, the information that we do have is pretty clear – this is not a case of vaccine injury, nor is it a case of an astounding cure by chelation therapy.