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from the staying-indoors-without-power dept.
A French woman has been awarded disability payments for a condition which is not recognized by medical science:
Despite dispute over the very existence of the syndrome, it has emerged that a French court has recognised a 39-year-old woman's disability claim for "hypersensitivity to electromagnetic waves".
In the first case of its kind in France, the Toulouse court awarded Martine Richard €800 ($900) a month for three years - according to Robin des Toits, an organisation that campaigns on behalf of sufferers. Electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS or électrosensibilité in French) is purportedly caused by exposure to electromagnetic fields such as those generated by WiFi and mobile phones.
In a statement on Wednesday, Étienne Cendrier, Robin des Toits spokesman, hailed the news as a victory, saying: "We can no longer say that it is a psychiatric illness." Victims of EHS say it causes headaches, joint pain, sleep disruption and dozens of other varying symptoms. Nonetheless the World Health Organisation has no clear diagnostic criteria for the condition.
Richard, a former playwright and radio documentary director from Marseille, says she is now forced to live in a remote part of the Pyrenees, without electricity, to escape from electromagnetic fields.
The French National Agency for Health Safety of Food, Environment and Labour (ANSES) accepts that those claiming électrosensibilité have real symptoms, but note the absence of "an experimentally reproducible causal link" to electromagnetic waves. A report is due in early 2016.
[Editors note: If you want to see an extreme case of this portrayed, check out Chuck in the first season of Better Call Saul}.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 29 2015, @10:44PM
A sick person generally would like to be cured. Sick people normally go through a hell of a lot if it means it will cure them. Like being cut open with a knife and having parts of their body removed or re-plumbed. Or putting up with the side effects of medications. Anyone who claims to have a mysterious illness that no one can find objective signs for and who also refuses any attempt at investigation let alone treatment is full of shit. And that is my medical advice as a doctor.
(Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 29 2015, @10:53PM
Hey, doc. Love your take on it.
Let me offer a little addendum: if the cure/investigation is worse than the management strategy for the symptoms, just maybe your heuristic won't apply.
So, in the spirit of equity, let's put it to the test. I'll submit to all the bluetooth-induced pain you like, as long as you sit right by me. I'll have a cheese grater, and your nipples will be exposed to my tender mercies for as long as I'm in pain.
But we'll make this fair. I'll take an IV with morphine. See? I'm sweet and reasonable.