Polite Dissent

Medical Notes

February 5th, 2005

Filed under: Medicine

Several interesting medical stories from around the country.

Several of the St. Louis Rams have come down with infections from MRSA (methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus), a particularly nasty and persistant germ. According to the article, some less-than-sanitary hygiene habits may be partially to blame. Catch the story over at Kevin, M.D.
A Florida doctor injected himself, his girlfriend and two other people with botulinum toxin — not Botox, but the unadulterated full-strength toxin, and they are all now paralyzed in critical condition. Recently, there’s been concern that the firm in Arizona that supplied the toxin (ostensibly for research purposes) may have known what was going on all along. Symtym has a concise rundown on the entire story.
Another vaccine success story with deaths from Chicken Pox dropping to their lowest level ever. Additionally, the number of Chicken Pox infections has dropped from 4 million cases per year to under 100,000 cases. These changes have all taken place in the nine years since the Varicella (i.e. Chicken Pox) vaccine has been available. The full story is available here.

Ratbat
February 6th, 2005 at 7:36 am

Arrgh. Chicken pox. I had that far later then I was supposed to. Then, remember those childhood illnesses that that’s one of? That you’re supposed to get and not get again? Apparently due to one thing or another, I got them but they didn’t ‘count’ and I’m just as susceptible as I ever was to the lot of ‘em. ah.

I’m blank on the botulism stuff, though…how did that doctor ‘accidentally’ inject himself and three other people? And what would they have been hoping for by doing that?
Ratbat
February 6th, 2005 at 7:37 am

Erps, ‘botulinum’. Brain cramp.
Scott
February 6th, 2005 at 8:39 am

I suspect the doctor thought he was injecting Botox, or more likely knew it wasn’t Botox but thought it would work the same way and was lots cheaper. Botox is a reduced strength purified botulinum toxin that is limited in its official uses (torticollis, for example), but is used “off-label” for facial wrinkle reduction.