Möbius syndrome is a rare congenital neurological disorder which is characterized by facial paralysis and the inability to move the eyes from side to side. Most people with Möbius syndrome are born with complete facial paralysis and cannot close their eyes or form facial expressions. Limb and chest wall abnormalities sometimes occur with the syndrome. People with Möbius syndrome have normal intelligence, although their lack of facial expression is sometimes incorrectly taken to be due to dullness or unfriendliness. It is named for Paul Julius Möbius, a German neurologist who first described the syndrome in 1888. In 1994, the "Moebius Syndrome Foundation" was founded, and later that year the first "Moebius Syndrome Foundation Conference" was held in Los Angeles. A charity for Möbius syndrome was set up and registered in the UK in 1999 by Linda Anderson from Tyne and Wear, whose son had been born with the condition in 1980. She campaigned for many years, held conferences and gave medical speeches in America before she had to step away from the charity because of ill health. Signs and symptoms
People with Möbius syndrome are born with facial paralysis and the inability to move their eyes laterally. Often, their upper lip is retracted due to muscle shrinkage. Occasionally, the cranial nerves V and VIII are affected.
Tonsillectomy, although once a reasonable treatment for recurrent streptococcal pharyngitis, is not indicated, as a person can still be infected with group A streptococcus without their tonsils. Antibiotic resistance and resurgence
A drug-resistant strain of scarlet fever, resistant to macrolide antibiotics such as erythromycin, but retaining drug-sensitivity to beta-lactam antibiotics such as penicillin, emerged in Hong Kong in 2011, accounting for at least two deaths in that city—the first such in over a decade. About 60% of circulating strains of the group A streptococcus that cause scarlet fever in Hong Kong are resistant to macrolide antibiotics, says Professor Kwok-yung Yuen, head of Hong Kong Universitys microbiology department. Previously, observed resistance rates had been 10–30%; the increase is likely the result of overuse of macrolide antibiotics in recent years.There was also an outbreak in the UK in 2014, and the National Health Service reported a 68% increase in the number of S. pyogenes identified in laboratory reports between 2014 and 2018.New research published in October 2020 in the journal that the bacterium appears to be getting more robust after being infected with viruses, specifically the North-East Asian serotype M12 (emm12) (group A Streptococcus, GAS). They found three new genes, acquired from viruses, leading to the development of "superantigens" targeting white blood cells, leading to a more virulent strain of the bacterium.A vaccine that will protect against the 180 to 200 types of bacteria causing the disease has been worked on for over 20 years, but as of 2020 a safe one had not yet been developed.