Christopher Logue, poet

I read All Day Permanent Red when it first came out in 2003 (or perhaps it was when it first came out in this country the year after). It's brilliant poetry. Here's what I said about it then:

[Logue]'s an English poet and occasional screenwriter who has reimagined the first battles of Homer's Iliad. His technique is often quite cinematic, with jump cuts and scene notes, and he renames characters from the epic without batting an eye. His imagery is a mix of historically accurate and wildly anachronistic (arrows carve tunnels through people's necks the width of a lipstick, a footsoldier's shield sprouts arrows as thick as the microphones at a politician's podium) but I felt the dust gritting under my palms and the blood in my mouth. The whole is as startling as a flick in the eye. Astonishing.

Logue died last month but I found myself thinking about him and his work again today as I pondered the next Hild novel--which might start with a big battle.

After lunch, restless, I was idly leafing through the magazines I didn't get around to reading over the holidays and came across the Economist's obituary of Logue. I don't know who the writer is, but I've read their work before: it's consistently fine. And this one is fantastic. You should read it. And if between us we can't persuade you to go read War Music or All Day Permanent Red then your notion of poetry is not mine.

If you've never read it, do so. I promise you'll be shocked awake. The world is worth being awake for.

GAFA fight!

Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon (GAFA) between them pretty much rule consumer tech world. (You can find a good analysis of the GAFA ecosystem--in audio--at the Economist's Babbage blog.) They began in different niches. Increasingly, though, they're thieving from each other's patch. (Google is doing books--half-heartedly. It's doing social media--unexcitingly. It's doing mobile--but without profit in the form of the free, open-source Android. Facebook is muscling in on advertising revenue. Apple... Eh, but you've all read all the news.)

Amazon changed the game, moved it up a gear, by bursting into the mobile hardware/portal scene with their inexpensive Kindle Fire tablet. And now, according to reports like this one from GalleyCat, Apple is rumoured to be planning a move onto Amazon's publishing turf with an announcement of an epublishing platform.

I'm guessing this is just the beginning of fun-filled invasion games. If I had to bet a sandwich, it would be that, next up, Facebook will do something interesting with content publishing. If I were them, I'd buy Goodreads, put out a cheap tablet, and build my own self-publishing set-up for both books and music. A poke in the eye for both As in the GAFA and another step towards reducing Google's relevance except as the provider of an open-source mobile platform.

So that's my (only partly joking) prediction for 2012. What's yours?

MS new hits the Washington Post

News of Dr Angelique Corthals' exciting paper on MS yesterday hit the Washington Post. I'm delighted.

This is how the NMSS responded:

Dr. Corthals’s paper adds to ongoing discussion about what causes MS, but since it is a review of published research, rather than results from original studies, the report carefully notes the need for more research.

The National MS Society welcomes the ideas of thoughtful people who want to end MS, and fully agrees that we need to pursue all promising leads to do so.

While I understand the NMSS's cautious response I'm looking forward to them taking the time to analyse Angelique's work and really get to grips with it.

ETA: For those who want a copy of the paper, drop a comment with your email address and I'll send it to you.

One-day writing workshop in Seattle

Clarion West is the world pinnacle of f/sf workshoppery. Every year, emerging writers from all over (Africa, Japan, the UK, US, Australia...) undergo a competetive selection process to be one of the eighteen chosen for a six-week immersive experience taught by the best writers in the business. (This year? Hiromi Goto, George R.R. Martin, Chuck Palahniuk, Mary Rosenblum, Kelly Link & Gavin Grant, Connie Willis.)

It's a life-changing experience. It's six weeks of nothing-but-writing, nothing-but-learning. It costs $3,600.

Have you ever wondered what it's like?

Well, the fabulous people who run that workshop have started a series of taster classes: one-off, one-day workshops right here in Seattle. They're a kind of literary salon, with a leader. They last six hours. They cost $125. They're for all writers, not just f/sf. And they're first-come, first-served. This is your chance to take a Clarion West for a test drive.

Each one-day workshop has a laser-sharp focus. Each is taught by writers with years of experience and multiple books under their belt.

Here's the line-up for the first quarter of this year:

★ Avoiding Rejection
Louise Marley
Sunday, January 15, 2012
10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Agents often only read the first ten pages of a novel before deciding if they want you as a client. Slush readers for magazines decide within a few paragraphs whether your short story is right for them. We'll practice techniques to make your manuscript grab the attention of an agent or editor from the first paragraph on.

★ Bringing the World to Life (Without Killing the Story)
Richard Paul Russo
Sunday, February 5, 2012
10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

How do you provide enough information about the physical, social, political, and other aspects of the story’s environment to fully engage your readers without distracting from or slowing down the story? Accomplishing this is one of a writer’s biggest challenges. Through discussion and written exercises, we’ll explore different approaches to scene-setting and description that bring the world of the story richly to life without losing the readers’ interest or engagement.

★ Creating Your Urban Fantasy World
Kat Richardson
Sunday, March 4, 2012
10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

This special-focus workshop will help you learn how to choose, establish, and write a setting (real, alternate, historical, or allegorical) appropriate for Urban Fantasy. You'll learn how to block out and write action that utilizes whatever magic, occult, or paranormal system you're establishing, and how to develop and write characters for Urban Fantasy by integrating their power(s) and skills--or lack of them--with their setting and interactions.

If you want to get into Louise Marley's workshop, you have exactly one week to get your application in (apply here by January 8). Louise is a great teacher, and whether you write litfic, urban fantasy, or gritty Napoleonic war fiction, it all begins with the first page. Start your engines...

And now we move on

This is how we began our celebration last night.

Every New Year's Eve since we've met, we've opened a bottle of Champagne (rarely just one) and talked about the year that's past. We wander all over the map: what we learnt, how we feel about that, what it means. They we start eating, and we talk about the year that's to come: our hopes, our dreams, our plans. As we talk, we gradually reach firm goals and hard targets. We talk the night away.

Last night I enjoyed my Champagne with particular intensity. It's the last alcohol for me for at least six weeks; I'm taking my lipid cycle in hand. (I'll talk about the diet, exercise, and so on in more detail another time.) I imagine that to begin with I'll get thin and a bit peevish. But then I'll become stronger, faster, better than before...

2012 is going to be a magnificent year. Stay tuned.

Destroy MS with spectacular violence!

For those who don't like reading serious science stuff, today I'm offering a fun and violent solution to the problem of multiple sclerosis. My favourite options:

1. Carpet-bomb it:

2. Drop a helicopter on it:

3. Chew it up with a twister:

4. Turn up the music and call in a missile strike:

On Sunday I'll return with a post about something sensible, like writing. Until then: Happy New Year! Go blow shit up!

Never piss off a writer

As a novelist I'm fond of reminding people: Never piss off a writer. A writer can immortalise an enemy by killingly them gruesomely, lingeringly, before millions of readers. (It's very satisfying.)

I am currently dissatisfied with the Quarterly Review of Biology. There's a paper in their latest issue that should be freely accessible but costs $14. However, it's difficult to write the death of a scholarly journal into a novel about the seventh century (my current work-in-progress). So I've had to resort to spectacular movie violence instead.

So, for all the millions of people with MS who want to read this paper and can't get to it, I made this for you. Turn it up loud:

MS is a metabolic disorder: the paper is finally out!

Dr Angelique Corthals' brilliant new understanding of MS, "Multiple Sclerosis is Not a Disease of the Immune System" is finally out! Full citation:

Angelique P. Corthals
The Quarterly Review of Biology
Vol. 86, No. 4 (December 2011), pp. 287-321
(article consists of 35 pages)

Right now, it looks as though free web access is restricted to those with JSTOR accounts. I'm a little taken aback by that (it was my understanding that it would be free for all). Hopefully, this is just a(nother) glitch. If you can't afford $14, I can send you the paper by email, and then you can send it on to others. For now, direct your healthcare professional to the link above; they'll no doubt have free access.

Meanwhile, my pr矇cis of the paper, and explanation of why this is not just another bit of hype, but a truly ground-breaking new paradigm, is here. And here's the abstract:

Multiple sclerosis is a complex neurodegenerative disease, thought to arise through autoimmunity against antigens of the central nervous system. The autoimmunity hypothesis fails to explain why genetic and environmental risk factors linked to the disease in one population tend to be unimportant in other populations. Despite great advances in documenting the cell and molecular mechanisms underlying MS pathophysiology, the autoimmunity framework has also been unable to develop a comprehensive explanation of the etiology of the disease. I propose a new framework for understanding MS as a dysfunction of the metabolism of lipids. Specifically, the homeostasis of lipid metabolism collapses during acute-phase inflammatory response triggered by a pathogen, trauma, or stress, starting a feedback loop of increased oxidative stress, inflammatory response, and proliferation of cytoxic foam cells that cross the blood brain barrier and both catabolize myelin and prevent remyelination. Understanding MS as a chronic metabolic disorder illuminates four aspects of disease onset and progression: 1) its pathophysiology; 2) genetic susceptibility; 3) environmental and pathogen triggers; and 4) the skewed sex ratio of patients. It also suggests new avenues for treatment.

Please spread the news as widely as you can. The sooner people are banging on the doors of the medical establishment, the sooner MS will be eradicated.

This is a tremendous way to prepare for the New Year. I, for one, will be folding the insights of this paper into my goals and resolutions for 2012.

ETA: As Heather points out in the comments, many library systems have JSTOR access. So try your friendly local library.

Cars crash from the sky

A funny thing happened on the way to lunch at Julia's today...

That Wallingford intersection will never be the same.

I'm now hoping the app maker will come up with some even better options. Top of my list: volcano eruption, tank attack, charging rhino. Also some Treacly Nice options would be cool, e.g. kittens tumbling from a box in the ceiling, unicorns and rainbows, an instant coating of sparkly frosting...

I blew up our Christmas tree

Making the Christmas tree is fun. Dismantling it such a hassle. So this year I blew it up instead:

FX from the free app, Action Movie, via GalleyCat.

Jaw-dropping news: Nixon was gay

From the Daily Mail:

He carpet-bombed Cambodia, spewed out anti-Semitic slurs and crude misogynistic jokes in the White House and smeared his political opponents with ruthless 'dirty tricks' campaigns.

And, of course, he lied to his country about his involvement in the Watergate scandal and went down in history as America's shiftiest, darkest President.

Given everything that Richard Nixon has been accused of, it's difficult to believe there could be any more skeletons left in his cupboard. But it seems there are.

[...]

A new biography by Don Fulsom, a veteran Washington reporter who covered the Nixon years, suggests the 37th U.S. President [...] may have been gay himself. If true, it would provide a fascinating insight into the motivation and behaviour of a notoriously secretive politician. (via @TheAdvocateMag)

Apparently the book, Nixon's Darkest Secrets, details Nixon's affair with a Florida 'non-member Mafia‑affiliate' called Charles 'Bebe' Rebozo. They held hands under the table. Rebozo had complete doesn't-even-have-to-give-his-name-to-the-Secret-Service access to Nixon in the White House--where he had his own bedroom. He chose Nixon's clothes. They held hands under the table. It's... Well, just... Whoa!

Part of me doesn't believe this: it's just a damn good way to sell a book. But part of me thinks this explains a very great deal. Go read the article. Even if they didn't actually have sex, the other revelations are just jaw-dropping.

What Hild saw

photo: BBC (couldn't find a credit for the photographer)

This photo was taken late last week in West Yorkshire--which in Hild's day (early seventh century), was the kingdom of Elmet (see nifty map). I'm trying to imagine Hild sitting outside on a bright twelve-days-of-Yule morning and watching those glide over the horizon. What would she have made of them? To me it looks like meringues carved by a god. (Big meringues, carved by a major god: those are wind turbines: easily over 100' tall.) But in Hild's time and place there was no meringue because there was no sugar.

So...carved driftwood? Whipped cream from a celestial cow? (I've no idea if the Anglo-Saxons whipped cream--it seems unlikely but, hey, so do those clouds.)

Technically speaking these are lenticular clouds:

Where stable moist air flows over a mountain or a range of mountains, a series of large-scale standing waves may form on the downwind side. If the temperature at the crest of the wave drops to the dew point, moisture in the air may condense to form lenticular clouds.

There aren't any mountains in Elmet/Leeds, though, so this is a rare sight. In Hild's day, a gift from the gods. I like to think she would have been pleased with the present.

To boldly glow...

Peoria, IL via GeekTyrant.com

If we did lights, this is what I'd put on top of our house. And it would flash and make that awesome go-to-warp wooshing sound whenever I turned them off.

Have a wonderful holiday, surrounded by comfort and love. I'm signing off for a day or two. I'll be back next week.

Which MS organisation most deserves a donation?

A couple of readers have asked my opinion regarding the best place to give money. Specifically, money to help encourage research and treatment options regarding Dr Angelique Corthals' exciting new understanding of multiple sclerosis (that it's a metabolic disorder akin to atherosclerosis).

I'm stumped. I used to be on the board of the Multiple Sclerosis Association (MSA) of King county. I didn't care for their approach--people with MS were to be helped but not consulted--but couldn't change their course. After a year or so of trying I resigned. Not long afterwards they were absorbed into the Great Northwest chapter of the NMSS.

I have absolutely nothing against the NMSS, I believe they do a great deal of good. But I'm wondering if there's a more nimble organisation, one willing and able to use a nice donation to help push further investigation into Dr. Corthals' insight into the etiology of the disease.

I'd love to hear your opinion on that. Information by the 28th Dec would be most helpful--so that kind donors can make their gift in time to take a deduction against their 2011 taxes. If you have thoughts to share, I'd eager to hear them.

Meanwhile, I wish you a warm and welcoming holiday with those you love.

A question and answers about diet, MS, and Terry Wahls MD

From: Diana Mackin

What do you think of Terry Wahls, MD?

I asked Angelique to answer this. She said, "QED. When you understand MS (and treat MS) in the context of a metabolic dysfunction, the results may be more obvious than with current immune system-based treatments (though it may depend on the stage/severity/type etc. of your MS)."

My answer is: when I was first diagnosed with ME (myalgic encephalomyelitis) in the UK in 1989, I took complete control of my diet. I cut out all processed foods. I took a specially designed combination of vitamins and minerals. I was already essentially vegetarian. I added fish and liver to my regimen.

I went from being unable to walk more than fifty yards without resting to running again. From horrible numbness and tingling to an apparently complete remission of symptoms. I also lost so much weight that people worried. (I found it hard to maintain weight without lots of starch.)

Then I came to this country, and stress and different diet and--frankly--complacency gradually sent me back to the numbness/fatigue place. Then came the limping. Then came full MS.

In 1997, I took three months and devoted it to zero alcohol, zero processed food, zero red meat. (Zero chocolate, sigh. Zero bread, sniff.) And became well enough to begin to study aikido.

Complacency struck again. Followed inevitably by loss of function. And MS. I gave up aikido. I graduated to a cane.

Rinse. Repeat.

I found it impossible to maintain a strict regimen with nothing to go on, no support or evidence but gut instinct. The medical profession wanted was to get me on immunomodulatory and -suppressive therapy and nagged me endlessly. Every now and again I'd try it--with disastrous results. I refused finally half a dozen years ago. I've continued to lose function, and now walk (I use the term loosely) with elbow crutches.

But now I have evidence. Now I have a cohesive framework. Now I'm beginning to form an idea of what lab results to measure. In the New Year I'll embark on a new regimen. It's daunting but exciting.

----

The QRB paper is still not live (no one knows why). But I do have a copy. If you want to see it, let me know and I'll email it to you. Also, Angelique is travelling and so won't have much time for responses for a while. Just FYI.

A terrible and beautiful vision

For all the support and signal boosting of the last two days: thank you. Thousands of people have now read my pr矇cis of the paper, by Dr. Angelique Corthals, that will be published tomorrow in the Quarterly Review of Biology.* That paper is a brilliant synthesis of what is known to be known about multiple sclerosis (MS). It takes the research we're all familiar with, the research that's been reviewed and replicated, that the medical establishment understands and is comfortable with, and fits in into a new pattern: MS is caused by faulty lipid metabolism.

This is a profound insight: MS is a metabolic disorder, not an autoimmune disease. It will change the way researchers approach the disease. It will change how doctors treat the disease. It will change the way people with MS live our lives. It will, one day--just possibly--lead to the eradication of MS.

As Angelique says, "When lipid metabolism fails in the arteries, you get atherosclerosis. When it happens in the central nervous system, you get MS." Think about that. Think about the fact that atherosclerosis is preventable and, sometimes, reversible. Now, so is MS.

It's difficult to explain what this means to someone with MS. I've spent nearly twenty years knowing that immunosuppression and -modulation didn't help my MS and never would but without the expertise to articulate exactly how and why. When I first read Angelique's rough draft earlier this year, it shook me to the core. I had a vision of ten years from now: a world without any new cases of MS.

It was a terrible and beautiful vision. Beautiful, because I'm so very glad for all those people for whom MS won't be a life squeezer, a life crusher, a life burden. Terrible, because at this stage I don't yet know how much better I can help myself become.**

Last night was the winter solstice. I thought, Tonight is the longest night, and tomorrow we turn towards the light. And that's how it feels.

Perhaps after the holidays I'll write about how I'm going to approach this new beginning. But for now, I want to thank you all again. Tomorrow there will be thousands of downloads of that paper. In the New Year, tens of thousands of people with MS all over the world will march into their doctor's offices and say, "Read this. Now, how are we going to take charge of this thing?" And it's all because you helped get the word out. So for those who have blogged, emailed, Facebooked, Google+'d, and Tweeted: thank you. Keep doing it. You are changing millions of lives.

---

* I'll link to the paper as soon as it goes live. It will be free to all. It's a very technical paper, but if the pr矇cis isn't enough to hold you until tomorrow morning, drop a comment or email me with your address and I'll email you a copy.
** By making changes to diet, supplementation, and exercise. I also don't know how fast research will move on variations on statins, fibrates and other extant drugs.

Huge news: multiple sclerosis is a metabolic disorder

***The paper is now published. Read it here.***

In the latest issue of the Quarterly Review of Biology (Vol 86 Number 4, December 2011), in a paper titled "Multiple Sclerosis is Not a Disease of the Immune System," Dr Angelique Corthals argues that multiple sclerosis (MS) isn't a disease of the immune system: it is caused by faulty lipid metabolism.

The very basic pr矇cis of the paper: looking at MS as a metabolic disorder helps to explains many puzzling aspects of the disease. MS cases are on the rise as a direct consequence of a high-sugar, high-animal-fat diet. MS is similar in many ways to atherosclerosis.

This is huge. It is not an incremental improvement of what's known about MS, it's a paradigm shift. It will change the way MS is understood, researched, and treated.

Full disclosure: Angelique is a good friend of mine. I've seen every draft of this paper. It is not original research. It's an overview of what is known to be known. It takes what has been researched, reviewed and replicated and reassembles it into something utterly new: a jigsaw puzzle in which, for the first time, all the pieces fit. There are no pieces left out, none hammered in with brute force. It's brilliant. It's elegant, clean, and makes complete and utter sense.

At some point soon I'll write about how this makes me feel. But today I want to give you the gist of the paper without editorialising. (All mistakes are mine; nifty illustration and direct quotes are from Angelique.)

WHAT THE PAPER SAYS

The medical profession has believed for a long time that MS is a disease in which the body’s own immune defenses attack nerve tissue in the central nervous system. [For an overview of changing medical wisdom, see The Incredible Journey, courtesy Rocky Mountain MS Center.] The disease's main characteristic is inflammation, then scarring, of tissue called myelin which insulates the brain and spinal cord. Over time this scarring can lead to profound neuron damage.

Researchers have thought that the fault lies with a runaway immune system, but no one's been been able to explain what triggers the onset of the disease. They've linked genes, diet, pathogens, and vitamin D deficiency to MS, but evidence for these risk factors is oddly inconsistent and often contradictory. This frustrates researchers in their search for effective treatment.

"Each time a genetic risk factor shows a significant increase in MS in one population, it's been found to be unimportant in another. Pathogens like Epstein-Barr virus have been implicated, but that doesn’t explain why genetically similar populations with similar pathogen loads have drastically different rates of disease. The search for MS triggers in the context of autoimmunity simply hasn’t led to any unifying conclusions about the etiology of the disease."

Understanding MS as metabolic in origin rather than autoimmune begins to bring the disease and its causes into focus. "The new approach explains both the recent rise in incidence and all pathological, genetic, and environmental aspects of the disease."

In other words, this new understanding of MS will finally make it possible to find effective treatment--including preventative treatment.

THE LIPID HYPOTHESIS

The etiology of MS (click to enlarge)

Corthals believes that the primary cause of MS can be traced to transcription factors in cell nuclei that control the uptake, breakdown, and release of lipids (fats and similar compounds) throughout the body. When the lipid-metabolizing function of these receptors, known as peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs), is disrupted, it can cause the accumulation of toxic lipids known as oxidized LDL, which form plaques on the affected tissues. The accumulation of plaque triggers an immune reaction, in part also regulated by the PPARs. With a failed inflammation control and the accumulation of oxLDL, the immune response runs amok and the toxic plaques leads to scarring of the tissue. The mechanism is essentially the same as atherosclerosis, in which PPARs' failure in heart cells leads to inflammation and an immune response in coronary arteries. "When lipid metabolism fails in the arteries, you get atherosclerosis. When it happens in the central nervous system, you get MS."

There are several risk factors for reduced PPAR function, including:

• a diet high in saturated fats and carbohydrates
• genetic predisposition
• environmental factors (such as poor exposure to sunlight or sources of vitamin D)

If the PPARs and the disruption of lipid homeostasis are the culprit in MS, it would explain why statin drugs, which are used to treat high cholesterol, have shown promise as an MS treatment. It would also explain why cases of the disease have been on the rise in recent decades. "In general people are increasing their intake of sugars and animal fats, which often leads to high LDL cholesterol. So we would expect to see higher rates of disease related to lipid metabolism—like heart disease and, in this case, MS."

It also sheds light on the vitamin D link. Vitamin D helps to lower LDL cholesterol, so it makes sense that vitamin D deficiency increases the likelihood of the disease—especially in the context of a high-fat/high-carbohydrates diet.

The lipid hypothesis also explains the inconsistent evidence for MS triggers. In many cases, Corthals says, having just one of the risk factors for reduced PPAR function isn’t enough to trigger a collapse of lipid metabolism. But more than one risk factor could cause problems. For example, a genetically weakened PPAR system on its own might not cause disease, but combining that with a poor diet can. Under these conditions, the body is "primed" for the onset of the disease, which is then triggered either by a pathogen (it can be any) or trauma, or even stress.

Finally, the lipid hypothesis also explains why MS is more prevalent in women.

"Men and women metabolize fats differently. In men, PPAR problems are more likely to occur in vascular tissue, which is why atherosclerosis is more prevalent in men. But because of the way women metabolize fat differently in relation to their reproductive role, their lipid metabolism is more likely to affect the production of myelin and the central nervous system, leading to the neurological equivalent of atherosclerosis. MS is more prevalent in women, just as atherosclerosis is more prevalent in men--but this framework excludes neither sex from developing the other disease."

Much more research is necessary to fully understand the role of PPARs in MS, but Corthals hopes that this new understanding of the disease could eventually lead to new treatments and prevention measures:

"This new framework makes a cure for MS closer than ever."

And that, dear reader, is the magic word: cure. For the first time, ever, I think there might one day be one. Even better, we might be able to prevent MS.

If you have questions--and I'm sure many of you do--please drop a comment here. Angelique has promised to answer as many as she can. I will, too. But please note: neither of us will give specific medical direction or advice. For one thing, I'm seriously not qualified. For another, there is no substitute for talking in person to your healthcare professional. I'm happy to share my opinion--I'm opinionated; it's my blog--but do not construe this as medical advice. Angelique will discuss her understanding of MS in general, particularly as it relates to this new paradigm. But she will not tell you what you should do. There will be no exceptions.

ETA: QRB is not yet live (sigh), so I've reverted the link to the forthcoming page. I'll update when this changes.

ETA2: This an emotional topic. I will be moderating comments here carefully. Please remember that neither Angelique nor I am making money from this. This blog post is a service. Don't even think of getting impolite or I'll delete your comment. Let's all play nicely.

ETA3: QRB informs us there's been a delay and the paper will go live on Friday. But I have a copy of the final document, the PDF that will be downloadable free in a couple of days. It's 25 pages of double-columned, densely argued fabulousness, with 9 pages of double-columned bibliography. It is solid. For those who know their PPARs from their peroxisomes and can't wait until Friday, email me.

A meta note

Yesterday I wrote about the big news about multiple sclerosis coming tomorrow from the Quarterly Review of Biology. I explained why it is such big news. And, trust me, it's the biggest news I've ever encountered about MS.

Tomorrow I'll post the precis of the paper ("Multiple sclerosis is not a disease of the immune system," by Dr. Angelique Corthals). I promise you won't need a graduate degree in biology to understand it. I'll even include a nifty diagramme. And hopefully a link to the free, downloadable article itself. (Assuming it's live. Right now it's just forthcoming.)

Today is just a signal-boost day. Think of it as the middle section of a school essay--you know the structure: say what you're going to say, say it, then say what you said. Except, hmmn, I suppose today is just the comma between saying what I'm going to say (which was yesterday) and saying what I am saying (which is tomorrow). Confused yet? Yeah, me too...

Come back tomorrow. All will be clear.

Coming soon: important news about MS

QRB's Forthcoming page (click to enlarge)

On Wednesday, December 21st, the Quarterly Review of Biology will publish "Multiple Sclerosis Is Not a Disease of the Immune System," by Dr. Angelique Corthals. It presents a revolutionary new framework for understanding the disease: MS is not an autoimmune disease, rather, it is caused by faulty lipid metabolism.

MS has been regarded as an autoimmune disease for decades. Billions of dollars have been spent on research depending on that premise. As a result, current treatments for MS are not particularly effective.

This paper explains why and, more importantly, offers a way forward.

I've been paying attention to research in the field since I was diagnosed with MS in 1993. I have a good understanding of the issues and a solid grasp of the scientific lexicon. Full disclosure: Dr. Corthals is a very good friend of mine and I've read every draft of this paper. I am fully convinced that her framework explains the contradictions that have puzzled researchers over the years, and answers their most frustrating questions*:

• Why does vitamin D play such an important role?
• How does diet affect the disease?
• Why do some studies suggest Epstein Barr (and other pathogens) trigger MS but other studies contradict this notion?
• How important is genetics in the development of MS?
• Can stress and physical trauma trigger the disease?
• Why are women more prone to MS than men?
• Why do drugs like statins sometimes seem to help MS?

This paper takes all the research of the last decade and fits it into a new pattern: a radical new understanding of MS.

However, it's an extremely technical paper, and long (70 pages--though 20 of them are the bibliography). So on Wednesday, when the article goes live**, I'll post a pr矇cis here that I hope will help readers grasp the essentials. (For those who know their PPARs from their peroxisomes, I recommend downloading the original.)

Angelique has given me permission to start discussing the paper before publication because it will have a powerful impact on people with MS and those who love us.

It takes a lot to move the needle of orthodoxy. Think of the MS ecosphere--people with MS, their loved ones, their doctors, their insurers, the pharmaceutical companies--as an ocean-going liner. It needs time to make a course correction. The sooner we start, the sooner we'll get the ship moving in the right direction and the sooner the right treatment will reach those who need it.

The odds are very good that you know someone with MS: there are more than 1.4 million of us (some estimates are much higher). For them--for us--I'd like you to help spread the word. If you know any media professionals (online, in print, on the airwaves), please point them to this post or the forthcoming Quarterly Review of Biology. Talk to your doctor. Talk to bloggers. Talk on Twitter. Just talk. Help move the needle. Think of it as a holiday gift to people with MS.

I'll be talking about this more fully on Wednesday.*** Angelique has also offered to answer questions then--or now, if you have them. Just drop a comment or send me email (see sidebar).

This paper doesn't offer a miracle cure. It doesn't offer an instant treatment. But it does point the way. Please help by pointing people you know to me or to Angelique (her contact info is on her website--the first address is best).

Thank you.

---

* All opinions in this blog post--and all the mistakes--are mine.

** The paper will be available to all as a free download.

*** The announced publication date of QRB is 12/21/11. If that doesn't happen--and delays do occur--I'll post the pr矇cis anyway. This is too important to wait.

Tree, with hangover

No, the tree doesn't have a hangover, the photographer does. Having said that, the tree was utterly dry this morning--it had sucked down all its water (replenished before bed) overnight. So perhaps it was also feeling a wee bit dehydrated. Eh, it's what the holidays are for.

Now I'm going to go eat a lot of bad food and watch some cheesy TV. Okay, I admit, not cheesy: I happen to be very fond of Highland: The Series. I even got this t-shirt to enhance my viewing pleasure: