FM

As for other immune aberrations, they abound in CFS and the literature is full of them. CFS is an immune activation state involving both innate and cognate immunity and it is quite easy to show something immunologically abnormal in any of these patients. The problem is non-specificity of these immune aberrations and the fact that they come and go over time as these patients evolve and adapt immunologically. The co-infections and co-morbidities also make this a real immunologic nightmare for high-specificity correlations to XMRV. Perhaps someone will come up with an immune marker for XMRV that is both sensitive and specific now that it is in our sights. However, even low CD4 is not sensitive and specific to HIV infection. CD4 is more sensitive to HIV-AIDS evolution but even here there is not complete specificity as NIAID has a non-HIV AIDS clinic with low CD4 counts filled with CFS.

As for overlap conditions in Dr. Mikovits’ cohort associated with CFS including FM and MCS and chronic Lyme and MS-like patients, I cannot speak to that. However, my clinic is filled with such overlap conditions. I suspect it will not matter very much. They are most likely infected with XMRV if they meet criteria for CFS with or without FM or MCS or chronic Lyme. Perhaps pure FM or pure MCS or pure Lyme will be different in degree of infection and maybe not. It will be very interesting to watch this data develop and expand to CFS-like conditions and the few pure FM and MCS cases that I have seen over the years. I have not really seen what I would call a pure Lyme case but many with CFS and a positive Igenex WB assay and antibiotic failure for chronic Lyme.