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Comment by mchpow | Hacker News Reader

I was always under the impression that CFS was a non-specfic set of symptoms; a kind of catch-all categorical bucket for an unknown condition.

If that's true, then that post-viral infection origin seems misleading.

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Why would that be misleading? This seems to be just an attempt to better understand (some of the / potential) causes that unknown condition. Perhaps it doesn't help to diagnose it, as there might not be any direct evidence left in the body to point at the original cause, but in the longer term it certainly helps if you know where to look.

Maybe.

It's just that if CFS doesn't point to something real, then that non-real, non-specific thing, having an origin doesn't really make sense.

But if it is actually real (and specific), as indicated by another commenter, the origin seems fine. Still seems like there's mixed views in medical community though.

MD here - I'd disagree. Although I've heard the same take from many other phsyicisans! Anyone who has worked with the condition (I've had 100s of CFSers by now) knows it's a pretty distinct syndrome. The CFS push-crash cycle especially is quite distinct.

Isn't the push-crash cycle pretty common in people that don't have CFS also?

No, in that for people who are fully healthy, they don't have periods of avoiding exertion due to fatigue, which precedes the push in the push-crash cycle. People with well-balanced health and energy can certainly over-exert themselves, but it's not a common cyclical pattern for them characterized by the push happening when some recovery from fatigue occurs.

It could still be the other way round. (In fact, the other way around is definitely true.)

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