MEDICAL experts in America are investigating a mystery epidemic with a sci-fi name, Morgellons, after hundreds of people have contacted internet sites claiming that they are suffering from it.

The US Centres for Disease Control (CDC) has formed a “Morgellons task force” after receiving up to 20 calls a day from “victims” citing a range of alien symptoms, from joint pain to gippy bowels.

Most describe crawling skin, sores, fatigue, “brain fog” and the appearance of small or microscopic fibres under the skin. Mary Leitao, who founded the Morgellons Research Foundation, claims that her son has the illness, and she found the symptoms described as “Morgellons” in a research paper from 1674.

Many doctors dismiss the condition as delusional. Dr Annette Matthews, a psychiatrist at the Oregon Health & Science University, calls Morgellons a form of delusional parasitosis, a paranoid fear that creatures are living inside you.

The CDC is “keeping an open mind” on Morgellons. But humankind has a history of odd psychosomatic epidemics, especially at times of social stress. The Industrial Revolution brought us “railway spine”, a set of unverifiable pain symptoms, and in the Middle Ages we had the “dancing plagues”, where whole villages danced themselves into delirium. Could Morgellons have more to do with global terror?

GM goats and the milk of kindness

GENETICALLY modified goats could help to save the lives of millions of children worldwide who die from diarrhoeal diseases every year.

Scientists at the University of California, Davis, say that they have bred goats with the gene for an enzyme found in human breast milk that can kill harmful bacteria.

They report in the journal Transgenic Research how milk from the genetically modified goats contains the enzyme, lysozyme, which in early tests seems to limit the growth of bacteria in intestines that cause infections and diarrhoea. It also appears to encourage the growth of beneficial intestinal bacteria.

The scientists hope that their breakthrough will lead to the production of herds of transgenic dairy goats that can be farmed by people in developing nations.

In Europe, regulators have this month approved another goat-milk therapy, which could help thousands of people with blood-clotting problems.

GTC Biotherapeutics has bred goats whose milk contains a human plasma protein with anticoagulant and anti-inflammatory properties. The company will extract the human protein from the goats’ milk and use it to produce anti-thromibin, which inhibits blood clots from forming, and may help to prevent deep-vein thrombosis and clotting problems during major surgery.

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