# 5148
Every once in awhile we see reports of unusual disease activity from around the globe. Our first hint of something amiss often comes from (usually) fragmentary reporting in the local media, and is often first detected by the newshounds on the flu forums.
These early media reports are often incomplete, conflicting, and difficult to decipher. Many are machine translated into English, which can add another layer of ambiguity to the report.
So I tend to wait before posting them, since the details often change over time.
That said, we’ve some curious reports out of Mexico this week of an outbreak of what they are generally describing as either Guillain Barre Syndrome or acute flaccid paralysis.
Tonka on FluTrackers began a thread on these reports on December 12th, which you can follow here, and which now has 30 posts. The latest media reports indicate that there are now 33 cases, and 2 deaths associated with this outbreak.
Although (almost inevitably) some media sources are mentioning vaccine-related adverse affects as a possible cause, health officials are cautioning people not to leap to any conclusions.
Yesterday’s Healthmap blog carried a short report yesterday on the outbreak, and ProMed Mail has an RFI (request for information) out as well.
While a country the size of Mexico (111 million people) could reasonably expect to see a couple of thousand cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome a year, the number and geographic clustering of these reports does seem out of the ordinary.
The diagnosis of GBS is primarily one of clinical assessment and exclusion. Diagnosis, particularly in its early stages, can be difficult.
This from the CDC’s Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) Q&A page.
What causes GBS?
Many things can cause GBS; about two-thirds of people who develop GBS symptoms do so several days or weeks after they have been sick with diarrhea or a respiratory illness. Infection with the bacterium Campylobacter jejuni is one of the most common risk factors for GBS.
People also can develop GBS after having the flu or other infections (such as cytomegalovirus and Epstein Barr virus). On very rare occasions, they may develop GBS in the days or weeks after getting a vaccination.
Since this seems to be an unusual outbreak of the syndrome, we’ll obviously be keeping a close eye on the investigation.
