Kurtzke JF

Language: Spanish
References: 15
Page: 90-99
PDF size: 265.86 Kb.

ABSTRACT

The geographic distribution of multiple sclerosis has been changing markedly in the last half century, with a slow spread from an apparent origin in Scandinavia toward one of almost uniform high frequency throughout Europe; a lessening of a high-north-lower-south diffe-rence in North America; and medium frequency rates for much of northern Africa, South America, and (now) even Japan. Migrants from high MS areas to low keep the risk of their birthplace only if they move beyond age 15, while those who move from low to high increase their risk of MS even beyond that of their new homeland for moves between birth and age 40 or so. MS occurred in the Faroe Islands as successive epidemics following their occupation by British troops in World War II. All these findings are compatible with the view that clinical MS is the rare result of a unique, but unknown, wides-pread persistent infection most often acquired between age 11 and 45 or so, and with a prolonged latent or incubation period between acquisition and clinical disease.

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