From: Emlyn O'regan (oregan.emlyn@healthsolve.com.au)
Date: Tue Nov 12 2002 - 22:54:20 MST
> On Wed, 13 Nov 2002, Emlyn O'regan wrote:
>
> > This leads me to ask a related question, about colds (ie:
> unidentified
> > respiratory tract greeblies), and maybe more generally
> about infectious
> > airborne diseases, which is this... how can I stop getting
> the damned
> > things? This last 6 months I've more or less constantly
> been hopping from
> > one "cold" to another, catching everything that goes around.
>
> Unfortunately there are something like 90+ strains of rhinoviruses.
> I went through the same thing when I started visting Russia. Visit
> Russia -- catch a cold. Presumably because they were previously
> unencountered strains. After you catch one strain you are immune
> to it, but it obviously takes a lot of exposure to catch the most
> common strains. I believe there are drugs in clinical trials that
> may have some efficacy in blocking rhinoviruses, but the generic
> cellular attachment they have is apparently very hard for an
> immune system to develop a defense against (I think the receptor
> attachment is in a pocket that antibodies cannot reach). So to
> develop immunity you have to build up antibodies to non-specific
> coat proteins that vary from strain to strain.
I think having tiny children in childcare is strong vector. The kids go off
to childcare with little or no immunity to common viruses, then catch them
from each other, culture them into a really good infectious batch, then
bring them home and give them to their imuno-hopeless dad. I'm hoping that
as the years go by, this assault will diminish.
>
> > I seem to catch these things more than most people, and I
> really can't
> > afford to. Does anyone have any good ideas about how not to
> catch the latest
> > sniffles?
>
> John's suggestions are good. In addition you could consider wearing
> a mask around the kids (or at least nixing mouth-to-mouth kissing).
:-(
>
> Also, zinc is a very important element for gene regulation
> (immune response).
> You should be supplementing this. I believe that it has also
> been shown
> that sucking on zinc losenges can shorten colds by 1-2 days.
Natasha said zinc, too. I've been recommended a particular zinc & echinacea
combo by someone I know (I always imagine that echinacea is an echidna
extract, but I don't think that's correct). I'll put that high up my list of
things to try. btw, any opinions on the effectiveness of echinacea?
> Finally, John is right about stress -- it *will* knock your immune
> system down. Consider taking classes in either meditation or
> biofeedback.
> Lacking those, perhaps Tai Chi or the Pilates exercise method (which
> I believe is on tapes in the U.S. currently) might be things
> to consider.
>
> Robert
Hmm, chilling out. There's an idea.
Emlyn
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