By the end of the article, we still don't know what's affecting the girls, but the author is strongly hinting in the direction of a mass pychogenic illness, a.k.a. mass hysteria, which has been a front-runner diagnosis from the beginning (although generally rejected by the victims and their parents).
There's no evidence of environmental contamination. One doctor has come up with a fringe diagnosis, and is treating for it, with some success, but international experts on his diagnosis say it's basically impossible. Oh, and there's a pattern of weak family ties in the homes of the afflicted girls. It ends with some talk of the successes of a doctor who is pursuing psychological therapy as the main treatment (along with exhaustive testing for other causes, just in case).
One doctor has come up with a fringe diagnosis, and is treating for it, with some success, but international experts on his diagnosis say it's basically impossible.
As he comments, it's hard to distinguish between his treatment and the placebo effect. Given that his treatment is mostly harmless (unless you're a bacterium), does it really matter?
At a similar event at Qawa Primary School on the Fijian island of Vanau Levu, the girls were cured by:
"[...]a Hindu priest (pandit) who asked the Hindu elephant god for help in appeasing the disturbed spirits of [an accidentally partially bulldozed sacred pool near the school playground] during a public Om Shanti ceremony."
from: OUTBREAK! The Encyclopedia of Extraordinary Social Behavior by Hilary Evans and Robert Bartholomew.
It's a shame that its so hard to convince people they have a psychogenic illness. My understanding is that the treatment is fairly straight forward and effective, as far those things go, if you can actually get someone to accept that they don't have some hot new plague.
What I found interesting was the neurologist's strategy for getting around this stigma - she would make the analogy to migraines (a common problem that people have no problem associating with mental illness) while reassuring them that she would keep checking for a physical cause.
By the end of the article, we still don't know what's affecting the girls, but the author is strongly hinting in the direction of a mass pychogenic illness, a.k.a. mass hysteria, which has been a front-runner diagnosis from the beginning (although generally rejected by the victims and their parents).
There's no evidence of environmental contamination. One doctor has come up with a fringe diagnosis, and is treating for it, with some success, but international experts on his diagnosis say it's basically impossible. Oh, and there's a pattern of weak family ties in the homes of the afflicted girls. It ends with some talk of the successes of a doctor who is pursuing psychological therapy as the main treatment (along with exhaustive testing for other causes, just in case).