Tapanui Flu

Tapanui Flu is a colloquial and outdated name used in New Zealand for myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), coined after an outbreak occurred in the Tapanui area in the early 1980s. Though sometimes still used informally, it has been replaced in the medical community with the terms: myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), post-viral fatigue syndrome (PVS), Chronic Fatigue Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (CFIDS) and/or chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). The term, Tapanui Flu, originated from a 1984 outbreak in the small, rural town of Tapanui, in West Otago in New Zealand's South Island, close to the boundary with Southland region.