Patients and families struggling with symptoms of a neurodegenerative illness are calling for a new investigation into potential environmental causes of the condition.
Their demands come 13 months after the province announced that the “neurological syndrome of unknown cause” doesn’t exist. The provincial Green Party held a news conference on Tuesday, March 28 alongside people affected by the condition.
There are now 147 people “demonstrating a rapid onset of severe neurological symptoms,” according to the group. They said more than a third of those patients are under 45 years old. Medical testing has shown that many of the patients were exposed to “multiple environmental toxins,” said Stacie Quigley Cormier, whose stepdaughter is among the patients.
In particular, she pointed to the herbicide glyphosate, which is widely used in forestry and agriculture.
“We want to confirm that in recent months, patients have tested positive for multiple environmental toxins, including glyphosate, with detectable levels between four and 40 times the average limit,” she told reporters.
Few details were immediately available, but she said “many patients have been tested.” Her stepdaughter, former Mount Allison University student Gabrielle Cormier, is one of the youngest patients affected by what officials previously called a neurological syndrome of unknown cause.
Memramcook-Tantramar MLA Megan Mitton, the Green Party’s health critic, said the province must “remove all barriers” and allow federal health officials to investigate. The group also called for federal Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos to “unmuzzle federal scientists” and launch an investigation with federal experts.
They also accused the provincial and federal governments of “misrepresenting” their patient files in order to “abandon a public health inquiry.”
Later that day, Mitton raised the issue in the Legislative Assembly during Question Period, as patients and family members gathered in the visitor’s gallery. Mitton cited a letter from Dr. Alier Marrero, the neurologist who first identified the contentious cluster.
“On January 30, Dr. Marrero once again raised his concerns about the unexpectedly high number of early onset or young onset progressive neurological syndromes in New Brunswick,” Mitton said.
“Will the Minister of Health get out of the way and allow the Public Health Agency of Canada to launch an investigation?”
Minister of Health Bruce Fitch said the department had received Marrero’s letter but denied “standing in the way” of an investigation.
“There’s a high degree of cooperation between New Brunswick Public Health and the Public Health Agency of Canada,” he said, and the federal agency “supported the results of the provincial investigation.”
“That is why the further investigation stopped, because the Public Health Agency of Canada agreed with the findings that were found here in the Province of New Brunswick.”
In response to a query from CHMA — the campus-community radio station in Sackville — the federal agency provided an emailed statement saying that it “provided support as requested by New Brunswick, throughout the investigation, until its conclusion.”
The federal health agency also “acknowledged the investigation’s findings that this cluster does not represent a neurological syndrome of unknown cause.”