Some Notes on Brucella and Mycoplasmas

Donald W. Scott Myalgic Encephalomyelitis As New Variant Brucellosis Journal Of Degenerative Diseases Vol: 2 No: 3, 3 February 2001, p13-19.

Lake Tahoe Epidemic

In the summer of 1984 the Tahoe-Truckee High School in northeast California was visited by a group of workmen who removed the heating/ air-conditioning system and replaced it with a unique new system. The new system had ducts to and from each room to the heater/ air conditioner which were designed in such a way that the air from each room was individually removed, heated or cooled, and then returned to the room it had come from. Except for incidental air exchange in the hallways, there was no effective mixture of air between the other rooms of the school. Thus, occupants of one room re-breathed the same air all day long. In addition, the windows, which previously could be opened, were shut and bolted and sealed. Teachers were strongly directed not to open the windows. One of the rooms was a teacher work room to which eight teachers were assigned. Within days of their return to school, these teachers were discussing the poor quality of the air in their work room. One of the eight refused to use the room and parked a camper trailer near the school to use as his work room. Within the next few months seven of the teachers in that room had become ill with one of the major epidemics of myalgic encephalomyelitis.

The only teacher not taken ill was the one who had refused to use the room. However, there were other teachers and some students in the school who became ill with the new 'mystery' disease which had so many features in common with chronic brucellosis. There were also student family members and baby-sitters who became ill. Two local doctors soon became the medical professionals of choice for the person's ill with the new disease: Drs. Paul Cheney and Dan Peterson who had located in the outlying community just months before the High School heating system had been replaced. Also, both doctors had been to medical school at the expense of the U.S. Government and were obliged by their contracts to serve a period of time at a place designated by the Department of Defense. The circumstantial evidence is very compelling that the Department of Defense had remodelled the school heating system so that eight teachers would be exposed to primary aerosol, while the remainder of teachers and the students would be exposed only to secondary aerosol.

According to Dr. MacAthur's theory, which had been challenged by Congressman Rood, those exposed to the primary aerosol would be disabled, while those exposed to secondary aerosol would be spared. Congressman Flood was apparently proven to be right. The new disease agent, quite likely based upon the brucella bacterial exotoxin, was contagious by secondary aerosol. The disease spread to the community and then to travellers. It was a 'mystery' to those who encountered it, since no. bacteria could be recovered from victims. They were ill with a bacterial disease, but without any bacteria detectable. This new disease drew the interest of Dr. Holmes of the CDC and of Dr. Straus of the NIH and it was they who came up with the suggestion that it was a variant of chronic mononucleosis. Step Eight: By 1987 there had been several outbreaks of the 'mystery' disease.