The Vaccinated Protect the Unvaccinated

If 234 000 deaths from COVID-19 could have been prevented with a primary series of vaccinations (https://bit.ly/3XrFXfz) between June 2021 and March 2022, I estimate that 140 400 of these deaths would have been among Republicans. This is, of course, not a surprise because Republicans are less likely to be vaccinated than Democrats, and, as the Texas Department of Health put it, “Texas Data Shows Unvaccinated People 20 times More Likely to Die From COVID-19” (https://bit.ly/3H0ACog). T...

 The Infection Metaphor

Every age has its signature afflictions. Thus, a bacterial age existed; at the latest, it ended with the discovery of antibiotics. Despite widespread fear of an influenza epidemic, we are not living in a viral age. Thanks to immunological technology, we have already left it behind. From a pathological standpoint, the incipient twenty-first century is determined neither by bacteria nor by viruses, but by neurons. Neurological illnesses such as depression, attention deficit hyperactivity disord...

 Exercise Creates Structural Stress

Now, the other kind of stress Structural stress from activity that physical activity cause is structural stress. Now, when I was running this morning, for example, my mitochondria were generating all kinds of ATP to fuel my body, but my mitochondria were also spewing out all kinds of reactive oxygen species, which cause widespread damage throughout my body. I was getting mutations in my DNA, those that damage is causing my telomeres at the end of my chromosomes to shorten its damaging cells. ...

 A 1700s Rich Man in Britain

The best that we have seen so far is a poor guide to what is possible. To get some inkling of this, consider the life of a rich man in Britain in 1700—a man with access to the best food, health care, and luxuries available at the time. For all his advantages, such a man could easily die of smallpox, syphilis, or typhus. If he needed surgery or had a toothache, the treatment would be agonising and carry a significant risk of infection. If he lived in London, the air he breathed would be seve...

 Iron and Fever

Warm-blooded animals have an elaborate physiological control system to maintain a constant body temperature. In man, this temperature is about 37°C. Any significant deviation from this temperature puts stress on the body and makes it difficult to maintain metabolic processes at their normal rates. Why then, during sickness, should the temperature rise? It would seem that development of fever would cause things to go from bad to worse, and make it more difficult for the body to recuperate. Fe...

 Fever Reducing Medicines Increase the Spread of Infection

To put our lower bound for fp into perspective, consider that approximately 41 400 (95% CI: 27 100–55 700) deaths per year are attributed to seasonal influenza epidemics in the United States [43] (and an order of magnitude more worldwide [44]). Taken at face value, our results indicate, for example, that if Embedded Image then at least 700 deaths per year (95% CI: 30–2100) (and many more serious illnesses) could be prevented in the US alone by avoiding antipyretic medication for the treat...