Re: IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome
Posted by X Factor on 11/04/08
My my my. I always suspected that Banana Slug experts such as
yourself had the potential to be sociopaths. I just never
thought we would all have the benefit of such a public display
of it. Oh, how is your great class action coming along? The
popcorn is ready to go. On 11/03/08, Myco X wrote:
> I suggest that, in the interest of furthering her research,
Dr. Bennett and her
> family continue to live in her water damaged home. With any
luck, she will be
> able to observe firsthand the effects of mycotoxicity in human
subjects.
>
> Armed with this information, Dr. Bennett could then
rationalize returning the
> fees that she has garnered as an expert witness for the
defense, either directly
> to the victims that she has harmed, or alternately, to set up
a fund to assist
> those impacted.
>
> However, if Dr. Bennett were so fortunate to actually be
directly affected herself,
> there would be little chance that she would have any financial
resources to draw
> on in short order, and her professional status would probably
be revoked by the
> State Medical Board, rendering her incapable of any continued
earning potential
> even if she was able to function with disabling illness.
>
> Myco
>
>
>
> On 11/02/08, Sharon wrote:
>> The American Society for Microbiology and the Infectious
>> Diseases Society of America Press Release, below.
>> ............................................................
>> ....................
>>
>> Medical News from
>> ICAAC-IDSA: A Joint Meeting of ASM and IDSA Meeting
>>
>>
>> ICAAC-IDSA: Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome
>>
>> WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 -- It was the smell of her Hurricane
>> Katrina-damaged home that transformed fungi geneticist Joan
>> Bennett, Ph.D., from a sick building syndrome skeptic into
>> a believer.
>>
>> Dr. Bennett, who had spent years studying the genetics of
>> fungi, was so cynical about claims of sick buildings that
>> she had even testified as an expert witness for insurance
>> companies, heaping scorn on homeowners' claims about
>> pathological mold and fungi.
>>
>> But when Dr. Bennett stepped into her New Orleans home
>> after the hurricane-driven floodwaters had receded from the
>> brick and plaster structure, her dubious shell began to
>> crack.
>>
>> "The overwhelming obnoxiousness of the odor and of the
>> enveloping air made me start to believe in something I
>> never had before -- sick building syndrome," she said at
>> the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and
>> Chemotherapy, held jointly with the Infectious Diseases
>> Society of America meeting.
>>
>> Dr. Bennett's confession came during a press conference
>> before a symposium on the links between human disease and
>> molds.
>>
>> Absent actual infection, such as athlete's foot, Dr.
>> Bennett's had thought fungi could not cause illness,
>> especially the seemingly disparate sick buildings
>> afflictions -- impotence, headaches, and hemorrhages.
>>
>> Then came Katrina.
>>
>> The hurricane left her home uninhabitable and many of her
>> possessions had to be destroyed -- victims of the way
>> fungi "eat."
>>
>> "Fungi have a strange way of gaining nutrition," Dr.
>> Bennett said. "They put enzymes and acids into the
>> environment, they turn everything out there to slime, then
>> they reabsorb it. They literally live in their food and in
>> their waste."
>>
>> That process, she now thinks, may release volatile organic
>> compounds that can have an effect on human health.
>>
>> "Perhaps what we're dealing with was not spores associated
>> with fungi, but some volatile compound," suggested Dr.
>> Bennett, who left Tulane University in New Orleans after
>> the hurricane to work at the School of Environmental and
>> Biological Sciences at Rutgers.
>>
>> Dr. Bennett is in the early stages of analyzing the fungi
>> in New Orleans homes and then testing the biological
>> effects of fungus-generated volatiles on worms.
>>
>> In the long run, she hopes to understand -- with the help
>> of animal models -- how fungi might affect the health of
>> humans.
>>
>> There are more than 3,000 volatile compounds produced by
>> each individual fungus, making it difficult for researchers
>> to pinpoint which fungus produces which volatile compound
>> and what effect it might have on human health, said David
>> Denning, M.D., of North Manchester General Hospital in
>> Manchester, England.
>>
>> "You've got multiple different fungi, multiple different
>> chemicals, and different susceptibilities and symptoms to
>> work there," Dr. Denning said. "It's quite a complex area."
>>
>> Dr. Denning's own work, presented here, concerned a
>> randomized clinical trial in which 60 severe asthma
>> patients were treated with the antifungal medication
>> itraconazole or given placebo.
>>
>> He said the patients given the itraconazole had a "very
>> significant benefit in quality of life," among 60&37; of the
>> patients. They also relied on fewer steroids and inhalers
>> to manage their asthma.
>>
>> The reason for the success of the treatment, he suggested,
>> is that some people are "hypersensitive" to fungi.
>>
>> "These individuals are sensitized so we can detect an
>> abnormal immune response, and those fungi seem to aggravate
>> their asthma," he said.
>>
>> Primary source: ICAAC-IDSA Meeting
>>
>> Complete ICAAC-IDSA Coverage
>>
>> http://www.medpagetoday.com/MeetingCoverage/ICAAC-IDSA/11529
>
Posts on this thread, including this one
- IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome, 11/02/08, by Sharon.
- Re: IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome, 11/03/08, by Myco X.
- Re: IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome, 11/04/08, by Deborah.
- Re: IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome, 11/04/08, by Sharon.
- Re: IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome, 11/04/08, by X Factor.
- Re: IDSA Fungi Geneticist Warns of Sick Building Syndrome, 11/06/08, by ff.
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