Mass Hysteria Mostly Affects Females In Schools

A Tennessee Study Tied The Symptoms To Being A Girl Or Woman

At A US Summer Program In 1970 Most Of 78 Sick Teens Were Female

Everyone Affected In One Virginia Outbreak Was A Girl Or A Woman

Parents In LeRoy New York Challenged A Mass Hysteria Diagnosis

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In October 2011 Several Teenage Girls At A LeRoy High School Fell Ill

They Developed Facial Tics And Muscle Twitching

Their Speech Also Became Garbled

A Neurology Institute Later Reviewed The Records Of 16 Patients

Fifteen Of Them Attended LeRoy Junior Senior High School

They Were Aged 13 To 19

The Other Patient Was A 36 Year Old Relative Of One Of Them

Fifteen Patients Identified As Female

One Identified As Male

The Patients' Symptoms Began Between September 2011 And December 2012

Every Patient Started With Tics

All But One Had Sudden Vocal And Motor Tics

Several Later Fainted Or Had Seizures That Were Not Epileptic

Migraines Followed For Some

The Tics Were Almost Identical From One Patient To The Next

Such Close Similarity Is Rare For 16 People At Once

By January 2012 The State Health Department Had Diagnosed Them

The Diagnosis Was Conversion Disorder

At That Point 14 Women And 1 Man Had Been Diagnosed

The LeRoy Cases Matched A Pattern Seen In Other Outbreaks

Many Documented Outbreaks Happen In Schools

They Mostly Affect Girls

The LeRoy Authors Offered Possible Reasons Schools Are Common

Students Spend Their Days Close To One Another

They Share The Same Exposures

Their Stages Of Development Are Similar

A School Also Has A Hierarchy

One Canadian Medical Review Listed Eight Typical Features

Together They Allow Doctors To Make A Presumptive Diagnosis

A Presumptive Diagnosis Is Made While Tests Are Still Underway

One Feature Is An Outbreak Inside A Group Set Apart From Others

A Second Is A Spread That Begins With Older Or Higher Status People

One More Is A Majority Of Female Participants

Researchers In Botswana Wrote That It Mostly Affects Females

They Named Schools As The Most Common Setting

Boarding Schools Were Singled Out In Particular

Factories And Prisons Are Other Common Settings

So Are Villages And Religious Institutions

The LeRoy Diagnosis Was Disputed Publicly

Environmental Activist Erin Brockovich Challenged It

She Opened Her Own Investigation Into The Cause

Some Linked The Illness To A 1970 Train Derailment

The Train Had Been Carrying Toxic Chemicals

Federal And State Officials Tested The School Grounds Extensively

They Found No Evidence Of Contamination

Other Doctors Proposed A Different Diagnosis Called PANDAS

PANDAS Is Linked To A Group A Strep Infection

It Purportedly Brings On Tics And Anxiety

A State Investigation Found That None Of The Cases Met Its Criteria

The Scientist Who Discovered PANDAS Examined Two Patients

Both Tested Negative

She Told A Local Newspaper A PANDAS Outbreak Was Unlikely

Her Reason Was The Ratio Of Boys To Girls

In A PANDAS Outbreak She Expected 3 Or 4 Boys For Every Girl

That Would Mean 40 To 50 Boys With Symptoms

LeRoy Had Just One

The Authors Wrote That Ruling Both Out Strengthened The Diagnosis

Studies Of Who Is Most Susceptible Have Given Conflicting Results