Sleepy Sickness

From 1916-1927, millions of people were affected by the Encephalitis Lethargica disease also known as sleepy sickness. The disease aims for the brain and makes its patient motionless and speechless. Almost one third people died due to the acute stages of the disease in conditions like deep sleep or in the state of insomnia due to which it got its name.

Survivors of the disease experienced miserable symptoms and side-effects such as severe migraines, fever, sore throat, hiccups, twitching and vision problems. All though few people did recover from it, most people eventually just died.

The Symptoms of the disease were so different and confusing that doctor struggled to identify it and this made it more difficult to discover a proper cure. The long time survivors faced a condition known as Parkinsonism. Their neurological system was affected in such a way that they practically existed like living statues.

By the end of 1930, the strange disease mysteriously disappeared all of a sudden. Though the disease has very rare cases now, no one really knows how exactly the disease occurred.

During 1960 a new drug called as L-dopa was discovered which showed the chances of curing the disease – Parkinsonism.

Oliver Sacks, a British neurologist was the first to treat his patients using the drug. In 1972, he published a book in which he described the effects of L-dopa on the patients who were asleep for about half a century. A patient named Rose.R, who was affected by the disease in 1926, was admitted in a hospital in 1935. In 1969, she was given the L-dopa drug which woke her up with her memories of 1920s which made her think of herself as still a young girl. After she came to her practical senses, everything became strange and unbearable for her which eventually made her think that she was better asleep not knowing the new world around her!