A desperate attempt by special interest groups to lever $$ donations out of the MS patients they purport to support*... with pharma and medical device ads as well as the occasional ADL advice column for R&R noobs distracted by years of misdiagnoses or nasty interferon side-effects, possibly unpaid med insurance claims.

National MS Society featured that Harvard study of VA dependents in their monthly newsletter emailed 20 Jan 2022.

The National MS Society invested in this study as part of its ongoing research commitment to ending MS.
[...]
The Harvard team used blood samples collected to test for HIV among more than 10 million active-duty United States military personnel between 1993 and 2013. Looking for specific antibodies that signal past infection, they determined the EBV status at the time the first sample was taken, and then followed additional samples to determine the relation between EBV infection and MS onset during the period of active duty. The team identified 801 people who developed MS and 1,566 controls without MS whose samples were available.
[...]
Using a novel tool called VirScan, which screens for evidence of an immune response [antibodies] to approximately 200 viruses, they also found no links between other viruses and MS risk.

The design is trash, and the hypothesis has been hanging for years. See Reich 2018 link (above).

On the environmental side, major risk factors include geographical latitude (higher incidence in more temperate climates), which may reflect seasonal changes in sunlight exposure influencing vitamin D levels or pathogens prevalent in these regions, although a genetic contribution is possible as well. Tobacco exposure, obesity, and mononucleosis are also associated with enhanced risk for developing MS. Mononucleosis results from infection by Epstein-Barr virus in the post-pubertal population, and only a minority of people with a history of mononucleosis (and a tiny minority of all those infected with the nearly ubiquitous Epstein-Barr virus) eventually develop MS. Viruses other than Epstein-Barr have been suggested as potential causes of MS or MS-related disease activity, but none has been definitively proven. Some of these may act as molecular mimics...

The lamest entry in the genre that I've come across since a mundane MS clinical diagnosis by an opthalmologist in '97 is (not as you might suspect, exposure to certain maple tree species), B12 deficiency "mimics" MS symptoms if not CNS demyelination, must draw blood--and that was out of the mouth of the 1st neuro I'd consulted since '99... before he got my MRI in his hot hands. The 2nd neuro I consulted (2018) didn't have access to a PC to read the CD, but did prescribe vit D because I was menopausal. So there's that. The 3rd--MD, PhD--to whom I read my DDI riot act, I refer above.

The only research breaking ground in org chem is sm molecule wght (BBB) mRNA in vitro experiments to switch progenitor neurons (OLGs) on and off as well as T- and B-cells. There's also a small body of clinical trials testing metabolic anti-imflammatory MoAs.  

* I didn't subscribe to MS Society or MS Foundation at all until 2021. I'd been advised by PC and neuro case workers that these organizations could provide transpo vouchers to med appointments. That turned out to be false.