After the death of five people suffering from Charcot’s disease in the village of Saint-Vaast-en-Chaussée (Somme) between 2007 and 2022, the Hauts-de-France regional health agency (ARS) contacted Public Health France, the two organizations announced on Monday January 22. “Five cases of residents, living in the same street or in a perpendicular street for one of them, having contracted the disease between 2007 and 2022” were confirmed, the ARS announced to Agence France-Presse (AFP), specifying that it was not aware “other cases reported in the municipality”.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), another name for Charcot disease, causes progressive paralysis of the muscles, creating a state of confinement in the patient, and generally causes death within three years. To date, there is no effective neuroprotective treatment.
“Frequent” clusters
The ARS therefore contacted the national public health agency to “determine whether there is in fact a statistical excess of diseases in the observed population”. At this stage, “investigations are ongoing” and have “first of all, the aim is to carefully document the cases”stage ” essential “ to the investigation of the cluster, Public Health France told AFP.
For Pierre-François Pradat, neurologist at the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital (APHP) and co-president of the scientific council of the Association for Research on ALS (ARSLA), the clusters are “frequent” and linked to ” chance “, he puts things into perspective. According to him, five cases between 2007 and 2022, “this is not a gigantic excess incidence given a disease that is still quite common”he adds, specifying that the disease was of genetic origin for 10% of patients.