ME isn’t just ‘exercise phobia’: it’s a physical illness

Imagine you’re diagnosed with epilepsy: what would you think if you weren’t referred to a specialist but taken to a psychiatrist to treat you for your ‘false illness beliefs’?

This is what happens to Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME) patients in the UK. They are told to ignore their symptoms, view themselves as healthy, and increase their exercise. The NHS guidelines amalgamate ME and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, assuming symptoms are caused by deconditioning and ‘exercise phobia’. Sufferers are offered Graded Exercise to increase fitness, and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to rid them of their ‘false illness beliefs’.

Enter Spectator writer Rod Liddle, who’s baffled by ME patients wanting better treatment than this. The culprit, he claims, is not the therapy, but society’s stigma of mental illness. With a strange logic, he asserts that because ME patients deny that they have a psychiatric disorder, this proves they have a psychiatric disorder.