How Dermatology Subreddits Mislead The Public About Morgellons Disease
If you were following the news this summer you may have seen a few articles about Morgellons Disease. Particularly, Reuters published an article dispelling the myth that ‘Morgellons nanobot parasites infect face masks’. What you may have missed however is the fact that the author of that article included a link to a reputable scientific paper demonstrating what the real Morgellons condition actually is.
Both Medscape and Dermatology Advisor also published articles about Morgellons this Summer. Amazingly, all three sources included links to unique scientific publications about Morgellons which demonstrate that the condition is associated with an infectious process.
If you have the Morgellons condition, and saw any of these articles, you may have felt confident to come out and present public information about your Morgellons experience. If you decided to share your photos on a subreddit about Dermatology however, you would likely have experienced exclusion, ridicule, and suggestions of mental health compromise.
I recently wrote an article about how to photograph Morgellons, but wanted to know if people who read it were going to be able to get help from a Dermatologist or if they would be referred out to a Lyme disease doctor. What I did not anticipate was the visceral hatred directed at my evidence of the Morgellons condition described in each of the articles published this Summer. The “Real Morgellons”, as it were.
I was banned outright from r/Dermatology, while one individual in r/SkinCareAddiction posted the U.S. Wikipedia article about Morgellons which fails to include any of the evidence reported on by Reuters, Medscape, or Dermatology Advisor. I responded with the France Wikipedia Morgellons article which does include that information, and the Time magazine article about how Wikipedia screws up articles about nine out of ten health conditions.
Regardless, I lost one third of my karma within hours after publishing the photos. I felt bullied, not accepted. But where did this hate originate? If Dermatology Advisor is not a reputable source, as indicated by the amount of downvotes it’s received on my post, then what makes Reddit and Wikipedia any more reputable? As of today I’m still “leaking karma” from the experience. So unfortunately, as it remains, I can certainly understand why Morgellons patients may want to continue to hide in the shadows despite increasing media recognition.
If you agree and want to help enact real change, share this story out with your friends and family. Maybe you know somebody who’s struggling for people to really understand?
