The National Center for Public Health and Pharmaceuticals (NNGYK) shared its data on patients suffering from ALS in response to Qubit’s public interest data request. Before 2020, the number of cases recognized and registered as motor neuron disease was 22. A total of 78 patients were reported between January 1, 2020 and September 30, 2023. In 2022 alone, 57 cases were registered, the data showed.
The NNGYK deduced the reasons as follows, what could have played a role in the dramatic increase in cases:
- reporting of rare diseases became mandatory;
- evolving diagnostic options;
- increasing clinical knowledge of rare diseases.
The NNGYK also added that the outstanding attention from the EU and the world in recent years, the development of data reporting discipline and its controls also contributed to the sudden increase.
Dániel Karsai’s younger brother, Péter Karsai the Almighty! on his team’s podcast, he talked about his brother’s illness and his fight for legal euthanasia. During the almost two-hour interview, he said that he knows from doctors: since the introduction of the coronavirus vaccine, there have been more ALS patients, their number has increased tenfold.
We contacted the president of the National Association of People with Rare and Congenital Disorders (RIROSZ), Gábor Pogány, on the subject. He wrote: he cannot confirm Péter Karsai’s statement. “There are no more patients coming to RIROSZ, or even to our member organizations dealing with rare muscle diseases, since Covid. “After asking the doctors who deal with these patients, they don’t see any significant changes either,” he stated.
