Research: Evidence for Mycoplasma ssp., Chlamydia pneumoniae, and Human Herpes Virus-6 Coinfections in the Blood of Patients with Autistic Spectrum Disorders

Authored by Nicolson, GL, Gan R., Nicolson NL, and Haier J. in Journal of Neuroscience Research, Volume 85, Issue 5, p. 1143-1148, (2007).

Article summary (posted Apr 30, 2007):

Children with autism may have more long-term infections than other children.

These authors have shown that soldiers from the Gulf War had chronic infections that they also passed on to their family. This study was done to see if children with autism had more infections than other children. They found that children with autism were more likely to have three types of infections: Mycoplasma (bacteria), C. pneumoniae (bacteria), and HHV-6 (virus). The study had only 48 children with autism and 45 age-matched controls. The authors suggest that treating these infections may help to improve the symptoms of autism.

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You can access the original abstract and the complete paper is sometimes available for free via Google Scholar (look for entries that say "PDF" or "HTML" on the right side of the page).
antibiotics, autism, bacteria, evidence-based medicine (EBM), family, infection, mycoplasma, neuroscience, virus
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