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Biotech / Medical : GUMM - Eliminate the Common Cold -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DanZ who wrote (4019)	11/29/2001 5:03:58 PM
From: Hank	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 5582

"Dr. Hirt's study concluded that Zicam is effective against naturally occurring colds. You can dismiss those results if you want but you haven't articulated a valid reason for doing so." What I dismiss is the notion that all of Dr. Hirt's subjects were suffering from a rhinovirus infection. Rhinovirus is not that difficult to culture in the lab. Had Dr. Hirt taken nasal swabs from each subject and verified that they were infected with rhinovirus, then you would have a valid point. The fact is he didn't differentiate between symptoms and the causative agent. As you know, there are a variety of maladies that cause cold symptoms. It could have been allergies. It could have been a mild case of the flu. It could have been coxsackievirus A9, which is an enterovirus and causes fever, sore throat, and rhinitis ( clues to your questions Mikey. Done yet?). At least Dr. Turner tested rhinovirus specifically. You can draw absolutely NO conclusions about what caused the subjects in Dr. Hirt's study to feel ill or what the basis was for any therapeutic effect Zicam had in these cases, if any. Additionally, as I have said before, the test population was WAY too small given the large number of rhinoviruses in the environment. One could argue that, assuming the majority of patients actually had a rhinovirus infection, they were all infected with the same strain and that Zicam is only effective against this one strain. Without the corresponding lab tests, you have no way of disproving this possibility. Although this protocol has been used by others, it is hardly accepted, as is evident by the statements of Dr. Turner and others.

To: DanZ who wrote (4019)	11/29/2001 9:51:07 PM
From: Hank	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to 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.