- LONDON (Reuters) - British
scientists said on Wednesday they had found a link between a common bowel
disorder and a type of bacteria that can be passed to humans in milk.
-
- Professor John Hermon-Taylor and his team at St George's
Hospital Medical School in London said they had detected Mycobacterium
avium paratuberculosis (MAP) bacteria in 92 percent of patients with Crohn's
disease, but in only 26 percent of patients in a control group.
-
- "The rate of detection of MAP in individuals with
Crohn's disease is highly significant and implicates this pathogen in disease
causation," they said in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology.
-
- "The problems caused by the MAP bug are a public
health tragedy," said Hermon-Taylor, who has sent a copy of the paper
to Britain's Chief Medical Officer Liam Donaldson.
-
- Crohn's disease causes inflammation of the intestine
and symptoms include diarrhea, pain, weight loss and tiredness. About 100,000
people in Britain alone are affected, with about 5,000 new cases reported
every year.
-
- The study was backed by the medical charity Action Research,
which said previous findings showed MAP is present in two percent of retail
pasteurized milk cartons.
-
- "The discovery that the MAP bug is present in the
vast majority of Crohn's sufferers means it is almost certainly causing
the intestinal inflammation," it said in a statement.
-
- "Action Research does not recommend that anyone
stops drinking milk. However, for those individuals with Crohn's disease
or their close relatives who may feel particularly at risk, it may be sensible
to start drinking UHT milk.
-
- "As UHT involves higher pasteurization temperatures,
it is probable that MAP is destroyed," it said.
-
- It called for Crohn's to be made a reportable disease,
for more stringent milk pasteurization, for tests for MAP in dairy herds,
and procedures for reducing MAP infection on farms.
-
- Hermon-Taylor said an unexpected finding of the research
showed that patients suffering from irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) may
also be infected with MAP.
-
- "In animals, MAP inflames the nerves of the gut,"
he said. "Recent work from Sweden shows that people with IBS also
have inflamed gut nerves. There is a real chance that the MAP bug may be
inflaming people's gut nerves and causing IBS."
-
-
-
- Copyright © 2003 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
Republication or redistribution of Reuters content is expressly prohibited
without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable
for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance
thereon.
|
