Comments on: Early Immune Warning System: A Bit of Evidence

By: Carlos Urzúa

Carlos Urzúa — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 20:52:22 +0000

Perhaps sneezing is also a sharing mechanism, not because of vaccination effect, because of the cappacity to spread the disease in a not so virulent form. If the microorganism can infect the most quantity of hosts without a very agressive strategy it will be stable and not evolve to increase virulence. If killing hosts is what infects the most hosts it will be selected to do so. Maybe the body developed this sneeze reflex as a prophylactic measure. Facilitating the spread of non-lethal diseases and in doing so preventing them from being seduced by the lethal option which is a very juicy alternative.

I once saw a talk which described how when a country with cholera controlled the sewage in a way that corpse & dying patient contaminated water was prevented from reaching the public supply, forced the bacterium to be less virulent, keeping people alive more as the fittest way to survive. The strategy didn’t eradicate, but attenuated the disease. Better to have seasonal flu than SARS.

Seth: Good points.

By: Adam

Adam — Sat, 15 Sep 2012 16:48:11 +0000

Then again, Japan has the crazy mutant forms of Gonorrhea resistant to *everything*, so they must be sharing germs somehow!

By: william

william — Sat, 15 Sep 2012 02:57:05 +0000

A book you might find interesting is The Epidemic of Absence by Moises Valasquez-Manoff.

By: joseph

joseph — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 20:50:41 +0000

hi
there is a NY Times article about autism its a OpEd, and the theory is that its a Immune Disorder
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/26/opinion/sunday/immune-disorders-and-autism.html?pagewanted=all

By: gwern

gwern — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 16:19:26 +0000

Counter-example: Japan.

By: lef

lef — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 15:39:19 +0000

in a previous post (what to do about antibiotic resistance?improve immune function) you mentioned this idea( listed as 3 there). You said there “So it’s not obvious that outside of hospitals more hand washing is a good thing”. I find it interesting because frequently I see that even people who criticize some aspects of cleanliness when it comes to washing hands they are mainstream.If you can make it more precise I think it will be even more interesting.for example what do you mean by more, 1)more than conventional guidelines suggest, 2)more than someone who doesn’t wash them even after using a public toilet,your meaning of more, is closer to 1 or closer to 2?

Seth: Closer to 1. But, actually, it isn’t clear at all to me what level of hand-washing is best.