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A comment on Iran says suspected schoolgirl poisonings occurred in more than 50 schools. Parent comment

Re:Iran says suspected schoolgirl poisonings occurred in mor... by dmix on Sunday March 05, 2023 @08:05PM (#35036243)
There has been plenty of examples of mass illness not connected to anything tangible, like a detectable disease or infections. The famous study on “long Covid” gave multiple examples of large groups of people experiencing symptoms with vague connections to any physical condition like headaches, fatigue, sleeplessness, generic “pain”, etc. They cited multiple other incidents such as the “gulf war syndrome” and a few others I can’t remember off hand.

These are very similar to mass hysteria. But they are connected to very real things like subsets of the population experiencing trauma. War and covid was traumatic mentally for a lot of people and that can manifest as other physical symptoms. Whether everyone in the group has a direct connection to those things or get grouped through circumstance and general interest by doctors/scientists/media is a big differentiator.

(Not saying this poisoning case fits this but it’s always good to be suspicious).

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Re:Iran says suspected schoolgirl poisonings occurred in mor... by Loquebantur on Monday March 06, 2023 @07:48AM (#35040331)
People being unable to find a cause for something does not make that event a diagnosable illness.

Essentially, you are confabulating a cause where there is not enough evidence.

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Re:Iran says suspected schoolgirl poisonings occurred in mor... by dmix on Monday March 06, 2023 @09:56PM (#35050988)
Yep just like fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome, both affects …certain types of personalies but also people with long histories of poor physical and mental health (which is trendy to get over-excused these days as being without any personal responsibility but there's still plenty of people with serious personal backgrounds where it's difficult to pass judgement). But ultimately the appearance of symptoms doesn’t make it an illness. Still a “syndrome” is better than “mass panic”.
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