Morgellons

Morgellons is the informal name of a self-diagnosed, scientifically unsubstantiated skin condition in which individuals have sores they believe contain fibrous material. It is not well understood, but the general medical consensus holds it to be a form of delusional parasitosis, on the psychiatric spectrum, with the sores typically resulting from compulsive scratching and any fibers found consistently traced to cotton and other textiles. The condition was named in 2002 by Mary Leitao, a mother who rejected the medical diagnosis of her son's delusional parasitosis, taking the name from a letter written by a mid-17th-century physician; Leitao and others involved in her Morgellons Research Foundation successfully lobbied members of the United States Congress and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to investigate, and CDC researchers who issued their multi-year study in January 2012 found no disease organisms in the samples examined, concluding the fibers were likely cotton and that the condition was similar to more commonly recognized conditions such as delusional infestation.