Wind farm syndrome

It used to be that visions were religious, as were communicable diseases. Visions of the Virgin Mary, Jesus and God were common in the ancient Christian world. Likewise, diseases were delivered via curses from the devil and his minions.

These days, most visions are products of technology and the modern world. Aliens abound, kidnapping and probing  the innocent. Visionary virgins are now rare, mostly hanging on in less technological agrarian societies.

Technology is also delivering new curses and diseases. Nothing is more cursory in the Australian landscape than wind farms, giving rise to wind farm syndrome – an illness with a range of symptoms they ascribe to the presence of wind generators. The scourge of the wind farm syndrome has prompted the Victorian government to mandate a 2 km distance between any new wind generator and a residence, pretty much killing new wind farms in the state.

Simon Chapman, Professor of Public Health at the University of Sydney has written a terrific article on wind farm syndrome, describing it as a nocebo, where a cause and effect relationship that has an illusory physical relationship is charged with causing a negative effect. I made light of it above, but for the people suffering from it, the disease is as real as one caused by a genuine pathogen. This suggests there are two issues that need to be addressed.

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