This afternoon, Health Minister Susan Sullivan announced that there were no measurable positive results from a controversial treatment for multiple sclerosis.
The results are from an observational study done by the province into the Zamboni "liberation" treatment which an Italian researcher believed could alleviate MS symptoms.
Other medical experts have been skeptical about the treatment.
The province refused to fund the treatment, but in September 2010 the government put up $400,000 to do an observational study on the results of the disorder.
Sullivan said the study resulted in "no measurable, objective benefit."
However people enrolled in the study reported "physical and psychological well-being" as a result of the treatment.
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I have been reading the comments on here, and it seems the pro-ccsvi people are not the only zealots. I myself am going for this procedure next week. I am doing so after watching this controversy unfold for the past few years. Initially, I was very skeptical, since MS "cures" are so frequent. I admit, I am not fully convinced by the research. I am convinced by the anecdotal evidence, the very thing that has been called the "lowest form" of evidence. While I totally agree that it is problematic and unscientific, it is also (in at least a few cases) undeniable. There is no way in hell that the disappearance of a limp, which has been present for years, can be a placebo effect. To suggest so is insulting, and it makes me suspicious of those making such claims. Yet I have observed this situation, and just that response, occur. Nobody is standing in the way of finding a cure by supporting CCSVI. Minimal progress has been made in the past 30 years, despite millions in research. There are people exploiting the CCSVI controversy on both sides. The bottom line, is that nobody has the right to tell me what I can try to deal with MS. Likewise, I would not ask taxpayers to pay for a procedure which is so far unproven. Don't delude yourself though, the DMD therapies are just as dangerous in terms of the placebo effect and exploiting people. They provide a sense of false security for the recently diagnosed, who want to believe that disease progression is at least somewhat within their control.