Similar to the "old friends" theory, I personally thought the issue with allergies and parasites suppressing allergies as a "calibration issue". Where evolution effectively set the dominant immune-systems to what would be hypersensitive in an environment without parasites order to compensate for parasites immuno-suppressing to protect themselves. Sort of like how sickle cell anemia genes were selected for its malaria resistance, in spite of how bad it is to be born with two copies of the gene.
Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
31–40 of 202 posts
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#32I don’t know enough to comment on the Hygiene / Old Friends hypothesis, but anecdotally it seems like almost everyone I know now has an allergy or autoimmune disorder of some sort. After giving birth, my sister suddenly developed something similar to celiac disease (but not quite the same; I don’t think doctors ever figured out exactly what it is) to where she can’t eat grains and a few other types of food as well. I…
Most people aren't actually interested in knowing what's going on. But one can find out. Even if one isn't conspiracy minded, it's quite obvious that oligarchs, their multinational companies and governments couldn't give a single fuck about normal people. PFAS and microplastics everywhere, rises in autoimmune diseases as well as allergies and Alzheimer's. Addictive amounts of sugar in a lot of food. GMOs everywhere u…
> Addictive amounts of sugar in a lot of food.
Realistically, this and seed oils are the only place you are going to really encounter GMOs. If you are avoiding such processed food anyway...
> GMOs everywhere unless you can pay extra for organic.
If you really must binge on the junk food and are concerned about any GMO content, why are you paying extra for organic? Why not just buy non-GMO products?
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#33>We can see that not all obstacles make you stronger. Destroy the cartilage in your knee, and it may never fully recover, since cartilage doesn’t grow back. // I'm not a medic but I recall this being disproven or shown to be at least partially a myth a few years ago - https://physicians.dukehealth.org/articles/humans-have-salam... from 2020, for example. Researchers showed that ankle cartilage is younger than knee- a…
Also runners have great knee cartilage compared to sedentary people, despite the myth. >Using motion capture and sophisticated computer modeling, the study confirms that running pummels knees more than walking does. But in the process, the authors conclude, running likely also fortifies and bulks up the cartilage, the rubbery tissue that cushions the ends of bones. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/21/well/move/why-run…
Is that causative though? Or do people with great cartilage simply enjoy running more because it isn't as painful?
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#34My "unpopular opinion" is that in 100 years, people will consider it very strange that most of the population was permanently infected with a bunch of viruses like EBV/HSV/CMV/HPV and nobody cared or did anything about it.
No governments cared or did anything about it, you mean.
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#35My "unpopular opinion" is that in 100 years, people will consider it very strange that most of the population was permanently infected with a bunch of viruses like EBV/HSV/CMV/HPV and nobody cared or did anything about it.
Almost certainly, but you're forgetting one thing - hindsight. We can look back a hundred years from today and say that treatments back then were very misguided (and possibly even barbaric). Knowledge and science advance with time.
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#36My "unpopular opinion" is that in 100 years, people will consider it very strange that most of the population was permanently infected with a bunch of viruses like EBV/HSV/CMV/HPV and nobody cared or did anything about it.
Accurate, especially with a hindsight bias. I suspect in the hundred years they would have largely forgotten that they couldn't really do much about it beyond say, shingles vaccinations. Sort of like how we'd facepalm at pre-germ theory medicine and all of the things "obviously" done wrong.
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most people aren't actually interested in knowing what's going on. But one can find out. Even if one isn't conspiracy minded, it's quite obvious that oligarchs, their multinational companies and governments couldn't give a single fuck about normal people. PFAS and microplastics everywhere, rises in autoimmune diseases as well as allergies and Alzheimer's. Addictive amounts of sugar in a lot of food. GMOs everywhere u…
> Addictive amounts of sugar in a lot of food. Realistically, this and seed oils are the only place you are going to really encounter GMOs. If you are avoiding such processed food anyway... > GMOs everywhere unless you can pay extra for organic. If you really must binge on the junk food and are concerned about any GMO content, why are you paying extra for organic? Why not just buy non-GMO products?
"Why not just buy non-GMO products?"
I think that is hard, since non-GMO can still contain GMO. Organic is a bit stricter, but I think also not 100% GMO free.
(Personally, I don't care about GMO, but organic)
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most GMOs are safe, with the possible exception of those that produce their own insecticide, and overspraying of herbicides on crops GMO'd to be more herbicide-resistant.
I don't trust any of the GMO vendors.
So you grow your own food from identity preserved seeds sourced from a vendor that has no association with GMOs?
If you buy commercial products, the non-GMO seeds are unquestionably being sourced from the very same GMO vendors, and thus can't be trusted either.
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#39> Comparing the immune system to a muscle that gets stronger with use is overly simplistic and, in many cases, inaccurate.
But a vaccine does something analogous: it "exercises" the immune system (hopefully harmlessly) to strengthen it for when real pathogens are encountered.
So between vaccines, and natural immunities developed by exposure to and recovering from a disease, the "getting stronger with use" comparison is generally correct.
Re: Your Immune System Is Not a Muscle
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sad to say, the fecal-oral cycle of infection remains common in the USA, with the most common areas of spread being restaurants although hospitals were sadly guilty of this until recently. And for any gastrointestinal illness in the USA, the single most common cause is Helicobacter pylori. Back in the 1980s and 1990s researchers mostly associated Helicobacter pylori with ulcers, but since then the research has expand…
Unfortunately, antibiotics can fuck up your gut in other ways.
Antibiotics seem to be underused for GI issues, anecdotally I’ve experienced a dramatic reduction (even elimination) of some GI issues when using antibiotics (Z-pack) for unrelated infections (a course followed by quality probiotics like Visibiome).
The positive changes seem sticky!