Arachnoiditis Awareness
Dear Duncan: I read with much interest the article published in the August-September 2006 edition (vol. 13, no. 5) of NEXUS, titled "Arachnoiditis: A Toxic Chemical Tragedy", where much of the content was taken from my 10 years of worldwide research (covering 107 countries) into chemically induced adhesive arachnoiditis (CIAA)

I wish to congratulate Gil May in drawing this horrendous "medically induced" progressive disease to your readers and, through them, the wider community.

CIAA is the end result of the use of a known "too toxic" chemical dye in a range of X-ray procedures. However, what is not commonly known is that the developers of the "dye", Kodak, knew it would cause CIAA before they licensed it (May 1944).

Today, there are 80 medical conditions or symptoms that have been recognised as a "cause or effect" of exposure to this "too toxic" chemical dye (NIH, 1994). Many of the drugs now used to treat these secondary conditions or symptoms of CIAA have been developed or patented by those who developed the original formula (for some, with slight changes of said formula; later, for instance, Myodil by GlaxoSmithKline).

I will go on the record to state the following: the developers of the diagnostic radiographic contrast medium knew before they applied for an NDA (new drug application) that it would cause arachnoiditis, and furthermore were aware of some of the other found reactions to this "dye" that were also not reported to the authorities.

I will go further and also place on the record that the collection of "secret studies" shows such; however, none was ever submitted to the FDA when applying for the NDA. Copies of all these "secret studies" are held in a bank safe on my behalf; these can be made available to any person who is willing to publicly publish such.

In closing, I would like to correct something referred to in this article, that being my email address which is wrong; the correct email address is ciaasa@bigpond.net.au.

Thank you,

Derek Morrison, BCW, ADCW, A&WT, founder of Chemically Induced Adhesive Arachnoiditis Sufferers of Australia (CIAASA) http://www.aasqa.info/