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The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

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Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#31

Post by mytailorisrich »

bombcar wrote: post #28
mytailorisrich wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the complex supply chains and processed/ready-made food we have nowadays I am wondering how much iodine makes its way into the diet of the Swiss today even without ioded table salt. I suspect that one of the issues was that most/all food used to be sourced locally, especially eggs and milk, which are good sources of iodine, with seafood probably mostly absent from the Swiss diet. Edit: apparently nowadays, and t…

Most processed food uses uniodized salt iirc, which is actually becoming a problem in parts of the USA where populations eat nothing but processed food.

My understanding is that in general there no need for supplements with a normal, balanced diet, especially with eggs, dairy products, grains, and others if iodine is naturally present in the environment.

So if Switzerland imports a lot of those, raw, or in prepared/processed food, or even the animal feed for its hens and cows the Swiss today probably already get much more iodine in their diet than 100 years ago.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#32

Post by suchire »

evanjrowley wrote: post #25
tekla wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am always flabbergasted when people question incredibly effective public health initiatives. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goitre#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodized_salt#In_public_health_... > Worldwide, iodine deficiency affects two billion people and is the leading preventable cause of intellectual and developmental disabilities.[1][2] According to public health experts, iodisation of salt may be the w…

It may not be a question of the initiative itself, rather, what conditions in Switzerland at the time led to an uptick in iodine deficiencies.

Maybe they should just RTFA

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#33

Post by routerl »

NelsonMinar wrote: post #4

Lovely article. It reminds me of the relationship of scurvy and Vitamin C. Despite scurvy being largely understood around 1750 the knowledge was forgotten or replaced with wrong theories as late as 1911. https://idlewords.com/2010/03/scott_and_scurvy.htm

Lovely. Thanks for posting that.

With all our popular narratives about the inevitability of scientific progress, it's always refreshing (from a historical point of view) and important (from a personal, ethical perspective) to remember that there's no guarantee that chronologically later developments will necessarily be improvements on earlier conclusions.

It brings to mind our current replication crises in science.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#34

Post by samus »

phkahler wrote: post #24

I am increasingly convinced that the "thyroid hormones" T1, T2, T3, and T4 are simply a place to store iodine. When iodine is needed somewhere in the body it can be taken from T4, converting it to T3. But it's not the case that "T3 is the active form" as you'll read in the literature, it's that the removed iodine is the active or useful thing. Changing the ratio of T3/T4 does cause a change in TSH (thyroid stimulatin…

... and congenital deafness, low length growth, neurological impairment, and other symptoms known as Congenital iodine deficiency syndrome.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#35

Post by samus »

pkdpic wrote: post #23

Great read, but I'm wondering why this began in the 1920's? Or was it always an issue for human beings living in Switzerland?

The condition has been described since Roman times, but not only in Switzerland. The problem also exists in other regions in the Alps and other mountain chains across the world.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#36

Post by throwaway8877 »

Shacklz wrote: post #19
catgary wrote: post #6

That was a fascinating read - there’s even a great villain in Eugene Bircher (not to get into politics, but he definitely seems to have trailblazer the “right wing populist attacks successful public health measures” strategy).

I always find it fascinating that we don't "anti-celebrate" such obvious failures in history more. I remember reading the original article of the author (linked in another comment in here) in German and I haven't ever heard of Bircher before. Peddling nonsense against better knowledge that causes this amount of suffering deserves ridicule in posterity. We shouldn't just celebrate those who do great things for humanit…

National shaming day.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#37

Post by dougmwne »

pkdpic wrote: post #23

Great read, but I'm wondering why this began in the 1920's? Or was it always an issue for human beings living in Switzerland?

The Victor Hugo quote in the article was from 1839. Biologically speaking, this must have always been an issue. The iodine had washed away from the area long before human settlement. Before modern medicine, it would have been difficult to collect the data and even establish the pattern. People did not travel much in pre-modern times and many of these mountain villages would receive highly educated visitors very infrequently. They may have been barely aware that their situation was anything other than normal. The world was beset with maladies and this was just one medical mystery among all the others. In 1875, life expectancy in Switzerland was just 38, so life must have been harsher than any modern person can imagine.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#38

Post by masswerk »

samus wrote: post #35
pkdpic wrote: post #23

Great read, but I'm wondering why this began in the 1920's? Or was it always an issue for human beings living in Switzerland?

The condition has been described since Roman times, but not only in Switzerland. The problem also exists in other regions in the Alps and other mountain chains across the world.

Speaking of the Alps and related regions, this was also considered a condition typical for Styrians (inhabitants of the country of Styria) in Austria.

Re: The curse of the goitre in Switzerland

#39

Post by lostlogin »

Faaak wrote: post #2

A really pleasant to read story. It's funny because I live in Switzerland and some of my friends debate the "ioded salt", and prefer to consume "natural salt" without the additives. Funny how history can repeat itself. I'm always impressed with all these doctors that would question the approach, try new protocols, and end up by finding a cure

What are the arguments used against iodised salt? Where would they get their iodine?
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