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An Important Step Towards Curing the Common Cold (and other viruses)


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Posted
  • Location: Ireland, probably South Tipperary
  • Weather Preferences: Cold, Snow, Windstorms and Thunderstorms
  • Location: Ireland, probably South Tipperary

Scientists just cracked the viral equivalent of the Enigma code

 

Peter Stockley is at war with the common cold. It’s a wily adversary: a single, seemingly indecipherable strand of genetic material that lacks a brain or even a complete cell, yet somehow knows how to latch on to an unsuspecting respiratory lining and replicate itself, wreaking havoc on the immune system.

 
But now Stockley, a professor at Britain’s University of Leeds, thinks he has the upper hand. He has cracked the viral equivalent of the Nazi “Enigma code,†which proved key to winning World War II: a genetic message embedded within the virus’s RNA that tells it how to assemble new versions of itself during replication.
 
 
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Posted
  • Location: The North Kent countryside
  • Weather Preferences: Hot summers, snowy winters and thunderstorms!
  • Location: The North Kent countryside

As much as I think advancements in medicine are a good thing, I cant help thinking that for the sake of our immune systems, catching things like a cold aren't a bad thing, in fact in the healthy it helps the immune system.

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Posted
  • Location: Ireland, probably South Tipperary
  • Weather Preferences: Cold, Snow, Windstorms and Thunderstorms
  • Location: Ireland, probably South Tipperary

As much as I think advancements in medicine are a good thing, I cant help thinking that for the sake of our immune systems, catching things like a cold aren't a bad thing, in fact in the healthy it helps the immune system.

 

Well, if it can help with HIV and other deadly viruses, then I'm all for it.

 

I'm not too sure how catching the common cold can do our immune systems much good, other than maybe making us better prepared for next time we catch it?

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Posted
  • Location: The North Kent countryside
  • Weather Preferences: Hot summers, snowy winters and thunderstorms!
  • Location: The North Kent countryside

Well, if it can help with HIV and other deadly viruses, then I'm all for it.

 

I'm not too sure how catching the common cold can do our immune systems much good, other than maybe making us better prepared for next time we catch it?

 

I'm with you on the serious virus thing.

 

When we have a cold (or many other viruses for that matter), our body creates an immunity to it so it can never be caught again. Thus our bodies build immunity from 'experience' so to speak.

 

Indeed survivors of Ebola are now immune to catching it again, an extreme example that no one should have to go through, but an example nevertheless.

 

I would be for eradicating serious viruses, but I think for things like the common cold and such, it's a bit unnecessary, unless you have a weak immune system that could lead to complications.

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Posted
  • Location: Ireland, probably South Tipperary
  • Weather Preferences: Cold, Snow, Windstorms and Thunderstorms
  • Location: Ireland, probably South Tipperary

I'm with you on the serious virus thing.

 

When we have a cold (or many other viruses for that matter), our body creates an immunity to it so it can never be caught again. Thus our bodies build immunity from 'experience' so to speak.

 

Indeed survivors of Ebola are now immune to catching it again, an extreme example that no one should have to go through, but an example nevertheless.

 

I would be for eradicating serious viruses, but I think for things like the common cold and such, it's a bit unnecessary, unless you have a weak immune system that could lead to complications.

 

My understanding was that we don't build an effective immunity to the common cold, because it mutates too quickly. Sure, you won't catch it off the person you've passed it on to, but you could catch another cold of somebody else just days after your original cold (if you're very unlucky!) due to the variants introduced by it's rapid mutations.

 

Agreed on the rest though. Additionally, we needs colds for excuses to take time off and get out of unwanted social gatherings!

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Posted
  • Location: Dorset
  • Weather Preferences: warehamwx.co.uk
  • Location: Dorset

The beginning of the end for the human race. I would hate to be born in say 50 years time, it will be unbearable!

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