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A Medical Mystery Unfolds in Minnesota
NY Times ^ | February 5, 2008 | DENISE GRADY

Posted on 02/06/2008 9:11:20 PM PST by neverdem

AUSTIN, Minn. — If you have to come down with a strange disease, this town of 23,000 on the wide-open prairie in southeastern Minnesota is a pretty good place to be. The Mayo Clinic, famous for diagnosing exotic ailments, owns the local medical center and shares some staff with it. Mayo itself is just 40 miles east in Rochester. And when it comes to investigating mysterious outbreaks, Minnesota has one of the strongest health departments and best-equipped laboratories in the country.

And the disease that confronted doctors at the Austin Medical Center here last fall was strange indeed. Three patients had the same highly unusual set of symptoms: fatigue, pain, weakness, numbness and tingling in the legs and feet.

The patients had something else in common, too: all worked at Quality Pork Processors, a local meatpacking plant.

The disorder seemed to involve nerve damage, but doctors had no idea what was causing it.

At the plant, nurses in the medical department had also begun to notice the same ominous pattern. The three workers had complained to them of “heavy legs,” and the nurses had urged them to see doctors. The nurses knew of a fourth case, too, and they feared that more workers would get sick, that a serious disease might be spreading through the plant.

“We put our heads together and said, ‘Something is out of sorts,’ ” said Carole Bower, the department head.

Austin’s biggest employer is Hormel Foods, maker of Spam, bacon and other processed meats (Austin even has a Spam museum). Quality Pork Processors, which backs onto the Hormel property, kills and butchers 19,000 hogs a day and sends most of them to Hormel. The complex, emitting clouds of steam and a distinctive scent, is easy to find from just about anywhere in town...

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: Minnesota
KEYWORDS: health; hormel; medicine; mysteryillness
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Nate Howard for The New York Times
Quality Pork Processors, right, adjacent to Hormel, left, employs 1,300 in Austin, Minn.
1 posted on 02/06/2008 9:11:22 PM PST by neverdem
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To: neverdem

Spam and Vienna Sausages! Now that is some real food!


2 posted on 02/06/2008 9:13:19 PM PST by pissant (Time for a CONSERVATIVE party)
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To: vetvetdoug

hog brain mystery


3 posted on 02/06/2008 9:13:53 PM PST by neverdem (I have to hope for a brokered GOP Convention. It can't get any worse.)
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To: neverdem

Cat Scratch Fever.


4 posted on 02/06/2008 9:19:55 PM PST by ButThreeLeftsDo (Blessed be the LORD my strength, which teacheth my hands to war, and my fingers to fight.)
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To: neverdem

Hmmm, I love Hormel’s breakfast sausage. No, I don’t want to know how it is made, thank you.


5 posted on 02/06/2008 9:20:12 PM PST by SatinDoll (Desperately seeking a conservative candidate.)
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To: pissant

i’ve never tasted the spam. vienna sausages (camping trip protein ONCE) are horrid. but, the bacon -yum yum good.


6 posted on 02/06/2008 9:20:22 PM PST by robomatik (......uh since fred and duncan are out, i think i need a new tagline. =()
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To: neverdem
....... or near the “head table,” where workers cut the meat off severed hog heads.......
......a worker would insert a metal hose into the foramen magnum, the opening that the spinal cord passes through. High-pressure blasts of compressed air then turned the brain into a slurry that squirted out through the same hole in the skull, often spraying brain tissue around and splattering the hose operator ........


Ohh please, I will never bitch about illegal immigration again, and please, please, let them take those jobs away from my fellow American.
7 posted on 02/06/2008 9:23:50 PM PST by modican
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To: pissant

I love spam sandwiches..mmmmmm..


8 posted on 02/06/2008 9:24:31 PM PST by lawnguy (The wand chooses the wizard, Mr. Potter.)
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To: robomatik

Well, if you haven’t had a fried SPAM sandwich you are deprived!


9 posted on 02/06/2008 9:27:23 PM PST by MHGinTN (Believing they cannot be deceived, they cannot be convinced when they are deceived.)
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To: neverdem
Interesting article. I was intrigued by this quote:

The aerosolized brain matter might have been inhaled or swallowed, or might have entered through the eyes, the mucous membranes of the nose or mouth, or breaks in the skin.
“It’s something no one would have anticipated or thought about,” said Dr. Michael Osterholm, an epidemiologist who is working as a consultant for Hormel and Quality Pork.

But somebody did think about it:

Deu 14:8 And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcass.

Also see the following links to see how pork may be related to multiple sclerosis, another neurological disease:

Pork, the suggested cause of Multiple Sclerosis

Bizarre medical theories: Eating Pork Causes Multiple Sclerosis

Multiple sclerosis, latitude and dietary fat: is pork the missing link?

10 posted on 02/06/2008 9:29:28 PM PST by DouglasKC
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To: modican
Ohh please, I will never bitch about illegal immigration again, and please, please, let them take those jobs away from my fellow American.


11 posted on 02/06/2008 9:29:42 PM PST by maine-iac7 (",,,but you can't fool all of the people all the time" LINCOLN)
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To: neverdem

Darn, I read all the way to the end and unlike a good book it had no happy ending.

I hope there is more news in the future.


12 posted on 02/06/2008 9:33:57 PM PST by 3D-JOY
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To: MHGinTN

taste like chicken? or ham? (i’m guessing ham)


13 posted on 02/06/2008 9:35:14 PM PST by robomatik (......uh since fred and duncan are out, i think i need a new tagline. =()
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To: maine-iac7

I guess that these “brain” jobs are not ones that Americans refuse to do! $12 per hour...


14 posted on 02/06/2008 9:36:43 PM PST by 3D-JOY
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To: lawnguy

Spam singles - what a great idea!


15 posted on 02/06/2008 9:37:34 PM PST by Kirkwood
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To: neverdem
sounds like they may need to;

Get rid of the high pressure air hose.
Find another way to flush the brains out, if it's that important to do so. Or find a way to deal with the skull, without messing with the brains at all.

Myself, I can't stand sweetbreads.

16 posted on 02/06/2008 9:42:32 PM PST by BlueDragon
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To: neverdem

The internal details of this story have pinned my gross-out meter on “overload.”

Good night!


17 posted on 02/06/2008 9:44:08 PM PST by Steely Tom (Steely's First Law of the Main Stream Media: if it doesn't advance the agenda, it's not news.)
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To: robomatik

Yes, more like Ham ... taste all its own though. Place a slab of cheddar cheese on top and slip it between two thick layers of lettuce and tomato and you’ve got a ‘diet’ burger. No bread, just wrap it in lettuce with tomato and onion inside. Best to cut your slabs from the wide side after extracting the mass in a chunk from the can.


18 posted on 02/06/2008 9:46:49 PM PST by MHGinTN (Believing they cannot be deceived, they cannot be convinced when they are deceived.)
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To: robomatik

Cubes are great for Wok stir-fry.


19 posted on 02/06/2008 9:47:56 PM PST by MHGinTN (Believing they cannot be deceived, they cannot be convinced when they are deceived.)
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To: neverdem

Interesting article, thanks for posting.


20 posted on 02/06/2008 9:50:44 PM PST by jazusamo (DefendOurMarines.org | DefendOurTroops.org)
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