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ARACHNOIDITIS A Toxic CHEMICAL TRAGEDY ARACHNOIDITIS CHEMICAL TOXIC TRAGEDY A devastating disease called arachnoiditis is caused by the corrosive action of certain dyes that have been used in spinal X-ray imaging, yet the sufferers are receiving no special treatment or compensation. Web of deception ‘magine that you have just got out of bed and turned on the TV. You hear that over 100,000 fellow Australians have been struck down with a mystery virus or infection. They are so devastatingly affected that many are in extreme agony, others want to end their life and the rest are crippled. This is not just another bad-luck medical story. This is a story of deliberate deception by a pharmaceutical drug manufacturer that has sacrificed people's health in the name of corporate profits, with the ongoing approval of the Australian Federal Government. This is an intensely sad human-interest story of a medical chemical that went horribly wrong and whose effects have been hushed up by both the Federal Government which approved it and the pharmaceutical company which manufactured it. This corrosive chemical is an oil-based acid called Iophendylate. It has been used as an imaging dye that is injected into the spinal canal before spinal X-rays (myelograms) to increase the contrast. It has been sold under brand names such as Pantopaque and Myodil. These dyes have been manufactured and sold by several chemical companies. Pantopaque was manufactured by Lafayette Pharmacal Company, later acquired by Alcon Laboratories, using materials supplied by the Eastman Kodak Company—amaterials originally designed for use in photographic processing. Pantopaque was approved for experimental use only in Australia between 1974 and 1978. Myodil is a copy of Pantopaque, made by the Glaxo Company between 1945 and 1988 and supplied in the UK and Australia, among other countries. According to a study commissioned by the New Zealand Ministry of Health and released in February 2002, from the 1940s to 1980s there were approximately one million oil myelograms performed each year throughout the world. However, with the advent of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), myelography with these kinds of chemical dyes is not performed as frequently. Jophendylate contains hydrochloric and sulphuric acid, potassium permanganate (raw iodine) and benzene (a cancer-causing substance) in an oil base. It causes an excruciating condition known as Arachnoiditis as it migrates throughout the body, causing massive allergic reactions and destroying tissues, nerves and organs, slowly causing death. When the chemical causes the nerves and spinal canal to "fuse" into a conglomerate of mixed-up tissues, nerves and spinal cord, this is called Adhesive Arachnoiditis, and it's the worst and cruellest form of the condition. Most people have not heard of arachnoiditis—such has been the paranoia of the government and the medical profession. It is one of Australia's greatest shames that patients, with government approval, were injected with this corrosive chemical. The drug Myodil was approved by the Australian Federal Government in 1970 and was used over a period of 19 years from 1970 to 1989. Can you imagine what this drug did to the patients' bodies? It corroded the spinal cord, nerves and tissues and migrated into the brain and other organs, causing excruciating, ballistic, nuclear hell (as many have described it), paralysis and even death for these innocent victims. Those who died were lucky; the others lived on, wheelchair-bound in intense pain or bedridden and crippled in agony. The name "arachnoiditis" arises from the sub-arachnoidal space at the bottom of the spine. If you look at a diagram of the human skeleton, you will see at the back of the pelvis four holes on either side where nerves from the legs go up into the spinal canal. It looks like the eight legs of a spider, hence "arachnoid"; and "-itis" is a suffix meaning "inflammation". So arachnoiditis is the result of body tissues and nerves being eaten away by this acid, leaving by Gil May, CMC, JP, AIMM © 2006 NEXUS + 33 Email: gilmay@qldnet.com.au AUGUST - SEPTEMBER 2006 www.nexusmagazine.com