Informant38

...Swedish scientists identified what may be a new form of life, a tiny particle in the spinal fluid of schizophrenics. In China, a vending machine was dispensing medicine to users who described their symptoms on a touch screen; more machines were expected to be installed in supermarkets. India's supreme court was investigating the painting of the Coca-Cola and Pepsi logos directly onto the rock face in the Himalaya mountains....

from Harper's Weekly Review.......

and further...Stockholm � Swedish scientists have found a tiny, mysterious particle in the spinal marrow fluid that could help explain the cause of schizophrenia.
"They may be involved in the development of the disease or may result from the disease process in brains of schizophrenic patients," the researchers said in an abstract of the study published Friday.
Schizophrenia is a widespread and debilitating form of mental disease with symptoms ranging from delusions and an altered sense of self to apathy and social withdrawal. It affects about 1 per cent of people.
Lennart Wetterberg, professor of psychiatry at Stockholm's St. Goran Hospital and one of the co-authors of the study, said the full significance of the findings is not clear and more research is needed.
"We have viruses, bacteria and prions � this could be an entirely new form of life," he told Reuters.
But he said this is just one theory, and it is still uncertain what form of life the particles, which are bigger than ordinary viruses but smaller than bacteria, represent.
The study, published in Neuroscience Letters, was made on the basis of spinal fluid obtained by lumbar puncture from 22 schizophrenic patients and 38 control patients.
The study found spherical particles � only 100,000th of a millimetre in size � in the spinal fluid of 20 of the 22 patients with schizophrenia against only two of the 38 controls, it said.
The particles did not include bacterial DNA material and had so far not replicated in culture.
"They are not any of the usual viruses or bacteria that have been found," Mr. Wetterberg said. "They are more like something like the prion, which is causing mad cow disease � but it took 15 years until it was found out what that really was."
He said it was too early to speculate whether the particles were a cause of schizophrenia or whether the disease caused them, and a bigger number of people would have to be studied.
"We have found the first link in a chain, and whether my excitement increases or decreases depends on the answer to the next step," he said.