#MEAction
For Support
For Research
For A Cure

ME/CFS affects up to 2.5 million people in the United States, over 80% of them women. The disease causes profound neurological, immunological and metabolic dysfunction - resulting in a level of debility that is on average equivalent to congestive heart failure or multiple sclerosis. Many ME/CFS patients end up homebound or bedbound, robbed of the lives they previously knew.

Myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), also known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, is a systemic neuroimmune condition that causes dysregulation of both the immune system and the nervous system. The effects of ME are devastating enough to leave 25% of patients housebound or bedbound. An estimated 15-30 million people around the world are suffering from ME. Approximately 75-85% of them are women and 80-90% of them are undiagnosed. The human cost of the current medical and policy neglect is tremendous. At the “mild” end of the spectrum, patients who still work may lose 50 percent of their previous function. Others are forced to abandon careers they loved - and the ability to support themselves and their families. Twenty-five percent of patients are shuttered in their homes or trapped in bed. At the most severe end of the spectrum, patients may live the rest of their lives in darkened rooms, unable to tolerate light, sound, or human touch. Only 4-8 percent fully recover. ME medical costs and lost productivity result in an estimated US $20 billion each year. In the US and the UK, there have been numerous cases of children being taken away from their parents and placed in foster care. In Europe, some severely ill patients have been forcibly institutionalized. Despite this incredible social cost, research is severely underfunded by governments across the globe. That is why we call on every government in the world to formally recognize ME and sufficiently fund research at the levels needed to treat and, ultimately, find a cure. ---------- ME Research Funding Statistics Around the Globe: 1) In the US, ME research funding is between $3-8 per patient per year. A similarly disabling disease such as multiple sclerosis receives about $242 per patient per year. 2) In the UK, MS has received 20 times the funding as ME. 3) In Canada, where 1.9% of the Canadian population have been diagnosed with ME, funding for ME patients averages around 11 cents per patient. 4) In Australia, approximately AUD 110,000 is allocated to ME/CFS each year.

Hundreds of patients have reported harm — some becoming housebound or bedbound, indefinitely — from graded exercise therapy (GET). Objective criticism from scientists and journalists have argued that there is no correlation between participation in GET and recovery. Yet public resources continue to fund trials such as MAGENTA, a UK trial of graded exercise therapy in children ages 8-17. After the feasibility study on 100 children is completed, MAGENTA will likely expand to a larger trial, with more young patients recruited. MAGENTA’s public documents, including the participant-information sheets given to prospective patients and their parents/carers in the feasibility trial do not convey the magnitude of the harm reported by patients. A document addressed to parents reads “We have used both treatments [GET and activity management] in our service and we are not aware of side effects. Studies in adults have also not shown that there are any side effects.” Therefore, the children in MAGENTA and those responsible for their well-being may not have given adequately informed consent. The rationale for performing additional GET studies in ME/CFS such as MAGENTA rest on the shoulders of the fundamentally-flawed PACE trial. PACE’s flaws are so well-known and so profound that over 40 scientists and doctors, including pediatricians, have signed an open letter stating that PACE’s “major flaws... have raised serious concerns about the validity, reliability and integrity of the findings”. Thousands have demanded retraction of PACE’s “misleading” analyses and 24 ME/CFS charities in 14 countries have demanded that its data be released for reanalysis: PACE is no basis for a trial in children or adults. Please sign now, and share this petition widely. Join with us to protect our community from research that ignores the biological realities of ME/CFS and promotes a potentially harmful therapy. You can find more information at: www.stopGET.org Are you a UK citizen or resident? If so, sign this UK parliament petition: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/166601. We aim for it to reach 10,000 signatures — fast — which guarantees a government response.