Posted on 02/21/2005 6:48:55 PM PST by quidnunc
Sobbing 31-stone (434 lb) Chris Leppard was dragged off to a mental hospital against his will by meddling social workers and police.
Chris, 23, has been forcibly detained for a month because he cannot stop eating.
The authorities used powers normally used to detain mentally ill people who might harm themselves or others.
They locked him up despite the fact neither he nor his family wanted him to go. Last night Chris’s furious mother Anne said he has no mental problems and was winning his fight against the rare illness that compels him to eat.
Chris’s case was condemned by opponents of a nanny state. They asked whether others with life-threatening addictions could be next.
Mum Anne, 49, told of the agonising moment the ambulance came to take Chris — without warning.
She said: “Four people turned up and after some questions, said they were taking him away. Chris was really upset, crying, saying he didn’t want to go and that he wasn’t mental.
“We didn’t know they were coming to take him. He is being punished for being ill. He has a physical problem. He was working well towards losing weight.
“He asked social services to give him six months to prove he could lose weight. They didn't give him six days. I had stopped giving him money for food. For the first time in years we were getting somewhere. We had locked food cupboards, that was a big step.”
Chris, of Hastings, East Sussex, suffers from an incurable condition called Prader-Willi Syndrome. It means he can’t tell when his stomach is full and could eat so much that it will kill him.
-snip-
Neal Boortz will love this story.
ROTFLMAOPMP
One of the best one liners I've ever read!
Oh yeah, I forgot.
It's so rare that the only recorded cases are of people in waddling distance of makets with large selections of junkfood.
Socialized medicine's idea of cost containment.
If this is incurable, are they going to keep him locked up for the rest of his life?
Or do they just let him out when he's lost 10 stone, so he can put the weight back up again?
Why not put him on the Subway diet instead?
I wouldn't say that Prader-Willi Syndrome compels one to eat. However, this man's obesity is not due to a simple love of cheeseburgers that makes so many people overweight, so it's really not a one-liner.
In addition to other mental and physical deficiencies, individuals with Prader-Willi lack the signaling system in which the stomach tells the brain that it's full. He literally has no idea whether or not he's full. Add to that the fact that folks with this disease tend to have obsessive-compulsive behaviors, and it's not hard to see why the majority of them have problems with obesity.
I don't understand how he can be put in a mental hospital, involuntarily, and without being committed by a parent.
Unless, of course, he has a mental capacity of a child. And his parents weren't helping him.
I don't understand how social services were involved.
He's still pissed that his brother Def got so famous.
Gee they lock this guy up so he wont harm himself---Yet---They let faggots run loose pumping each other in the butt, and catching Aids . Isnt that harming themselves?
Leppard. Spots. Do the math.
23 years old and he's crying for his mommy? Someone give this guy a big piece of cake.
PWS is a complex genetic disorder that includes short stature, mental retardation or learning disabilities, incomplete sexual development, characteristic behavior problems, low muscle tone, and an involuntary urge to eat constantly, which, coupled with a reduced need for calories, leads to obesity.
How many guys did it take to drag him off?
How bout telling him to stop after the third cheeseburger.
So this guy is somewhat retarded?
Oh, okay.
Makes a little more sense, as to why, social services were involved.
More to this than first assumed from reading the article.
Certainly they wouldn't check his political activities before making their decision...
Also known as Moore-Kennedy Syndrome.
"...let him out when he's lost 10 stone,..."
Happygal, clue us Yanks in, what's the weight of a "stone"? and how does it relate to poundage?
There are fourteen pounds in a stone.
So 10 stone, is 140 lbs.
And his uncle Raymond too.
Prader Willi is a PHYSICAL, not a MENTAL illness. What's next; jail for diabetics because they can't "control" their blood sugar?
Background: Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is a chromosomal microdeletion/disomy disorder arising from deletion or disruption of genes in the proximal arm of chromosome 15 or maternal disomy of the proximal arm of chromosome 15. Commonly associated characteristics of this disorder include diminished fetal activity, obesity, hypotonia, mental retardation, short stature, hypogonadotropic hypogonadism, strabismus, and small hands and feet.
In 1887, Langdon-Down described the first patient with PWS as an adolescent girl with mental impairment, short stature, hypogonadism, and obesity and labeled her as having polysarcia. Prader et al reported a series of patients with similar phenotypes in 1956. In 1981, Ledbetter et al identified microdeletions within chromosome 15 as the site for PWS.
Pathophysiology: Prader-Willi syndrome is the first human disorder attributed to genomic imprinting. In disorders attributed to genomic imprinting, genes are expressed differentially based upon the parent of origin. An imprinting center has been identified within 15q11-13; gene expression may be regulated by DNA methylation at cytosine bases. Prader-Willi syndrome results from the loss of imprinted genomic material within the paternal 15q11.2-13 locus. The loss of maternal genomic material at the 15q11.2-13 locus results in Angelman syndrome.
Most cases of PSW involving deletions, unbalanced translocations, and uniparental (maternal) disomy occur sporadically. Approximately 70% of cases of PWS arise from deletion of 15q11-13 on chromosome 15. Twenty-eight percent of cases of PWS arise from maternal uniparental disomy caused by chromosomal nondisjunction.
Several genes have been mapped to the 15q11.2-13 region, including the SNRPN gene, P gene (type II oculocutaneous albinism), UBE3A gene (encodes a ubiquitin-protein ligase involved in intracellular protein turnover) and necdin gene (codes for a nuclear protein expressed exclusively in the differentiated mouse brain). Mutations associated with the maternal UBE3A gene result in Angelman syndrome.
Frequency:
* In the US: Most cases of PWS are sporadic in occurrence. Rate of prevalence has been reported to be 1 per 16,062 by Burd et al and 1 per 25,000 by Butler.
* Internationally: Cases of PWS have been reported worldwide. Reported prevalence rates for PWS range from 1 per 8000 in rural Sweden to 1 per 16,000 in Western Japan.
Mortality/Morbidity: Complications from obesity (eg, slipped capital femoral epiphyses, sleep apnea, cor pulmonale, type II diabetes mellitus) and behavioral problems are major contributors to morbidity and mortality of PWS (see Complications). Lamb et al previously reported premature development of atherosclerosis with severe coronary artery disease in an individual aged 26 years with PWS, morbid obesity, and non–insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus.
Race: Differences in prevalence between racial groups have not been reported.
Sex: PWS arises from loss of the paternal copy of the proximal arm of chromosome 15 in the region of 15p11-13. Differences in prevalence between sexes have not been reported.
Age: PWS is a genetic disorder with lifelong implications for the individual who is affected with PWS.
Clarification: it's a disease based on a PHYSICAL cause, with both physical and behavioral impairments.
Well, not some of the super models anyway. They don't eat ~ but they do shoot up, eh?!
P-W affects appetite--the desire for food. It doesn't force people to suddenly expand.
And for some reason you don't see it much in Somalia.
Prader Willi is a serious and rare syndrome. I have a relative who is battleing it. The hungary button is on all the time. Not a gluttony issue, but a brain malfuction.
No, they will probably give him a bypass if he agrees. It is the only cure for the syndrome and often has to be performed repeatedly.
Well, I hope they can help this guy out. He's only 23. He has his life ahead of him.
If he has Prader-Willi, then that's true. Those with it ALWAYS feel as though they are starving, no matter how much they eat.
Mr. Parrot you are under arrest...You have the right to eat healthy. If you give up that right, anything you do eat can and will be held against you in court. You have the right to a carrot. If you can't afford a carrot, one will be provided for you.
Do you understand these rights? Get your fat a$$ in the car.
Right, and now, at 434 pounds he hasn't likely seen his toes in close to four years so if someone loans him a toenail clipper he will likely amputate half of his insole and the heel of his best boot.
I don't think it is helping him if they do it in a cruel and barbaric manner. If they take him and starve him so bad he wished he were dead, that would be a cruelty that you would not want to have done to a pet. When the state is handling humans like this they are fascists. And, when they are acting like fascists, they are not good natured chaps. They will put this poor soul through hell, mark my words.
Exactly what I was thinking. If he was an American and we had socialized healthcare I would be praising their actions.
Hardly.
Prader-Willi is real. There are a whole series of related symptoms. The first one usually noticed is a weak suckling reflex. ...then between one and two years of age they begin to eat voraciously. They will eat until there is no food available...and given that they feel as though they are starving, that means that they will eat anything they perceive as edible, such as sticks of butter, baking materials, raw eggs - even rancid food. They tend to have little perception of physical pain, and if they become morbidly obese, it results in about a 20 point IQ loss from before they gained that weight (normal people who get fat do not have this intelligence difference). This intelligence loss appears to be permanent.
Further, they actually have lower calorie requirements than normal people, sometimes drastically lower. Nearly all used to die before mid-teens. In many cases,puberty is delayed, and when it does occur, it is often a very gradual thing.
When caught early, sometimes they can be prevented from ever gaining the weight, but a strict discipline must be applied continuously.
It's all about the body's systems not being able to say "stop".
The article, unfortunately, mentioned the "rare illness that compels him to eat".
Seems to me the reporter didn't pay any attention to the scientific information or was driven (by an editor) to use "popular language" in this article thereby getting everything wrong.
Then there are the folks here who always fail to see what is written and instead imagine insult when none is meant.
All of us have this "rare illness" and are compelled to eat every day. Fortunately we do not have Prader-Willi and are able to stop!
It's all about the body's systems not being able to say "stop".
The article, unfortunately, mentioned the "rare illness that compels him to eat".
Seems to me the reporter didn't pay any attention to the scientific information or was driven (by an editor) to use "popular language" in this article thereby getting everything wrong.
Then there are the folks here who always fail to see what is written and instead imagine insult when none is meant.
All of us have this "rare illness" and are compelled to eat every day. Fortunately we do not have Prader-Willi and are able to stop!
I never said it wasn't real, I said it was rare, which it most certainly is.
If you wanna discuss this we can discuss it, but only if you respond to positions I actually hold. If not, ahve a good one.
Great site: liked the part about not being able to vomit.
Thanks for the summary.
Not necessarily, in the particulars. The average person with Prader-Willi is about 5-10 IQ points lower than the average normal person, if they've never gained the weight. If they have gained the weight, then their average is 25-30 IQ points down. In families where most of the kids are smart, they may be still smart...just less so than their siblings.
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