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Biotech / Medical : GUMM - Eliminate the Common Cold

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To: DanZ who wrote (4019)11/29/2001 9:51:07 PM
From: Hank  Read Replies (1) of 5582
 
"Personally I don't believe that Zicam is effective against every strain of rhinovirus. I believe that it is effective against the most commonly occurring rhinoviruses."

What leads you to believe that Dan? Do you know what the "most commonly occurring rhinoviruses" are? I know you don't because nobody does. What is "commonly occurring" in one geographic area at any one time might not be so in another. The fact is, if you take the world's population as whole, all of the rhinoviruses are likely to be present in equal numbers. It's their distribution at any one time that will be different. The more isolated a population of individuals is, the more likely they are all infected with the same strain.

Did you ever wonder why most people tend to get colds less frequently the older they get? Did you ever wonder why people never develop an immunity to rhinoviruses even though they may have dozens of colds in a lifetime? An expert in the rhinovirus field once told me that the reason why people don't become immune to colds is because each time they get sick with a rhinovirus infection, it's usually a serotype they've never been exposed to before. The fact is, people DO become immune to specific serotypes. However, with over 100 serotypes to get sick from, the odds are that no matter how many colds you've had in the past, you'll eventually get exposed to a strain you've never become exposed to before and become sick.

The Dr. Hirt study was conducted on a small number of patients from only ONE geographic area. Assuming they were all infected with rhinovirus, this significantly increases the probability that they were all suffering from the same serotype. This study not only fails to prove that it treated rhinovirus infections but it is impossible to conclude how many strains of rhinovirus the subjects may have been infected with, if any.
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