Slashdot Mirror
Overly Sanitized Environments Lead to Poor Health?
bignickel writes "A recently-released study examined the health implications of living in an overly hygienic environment. According to the 'hygiene hypothesis,' living in such an environment early in life can lead to problems with allergies and autoimmune diseases. The study compared lab rodents with rats and mice living in the wild. Time to stop Lysol-bombing the house?"
I'm not a doctor but I couldn't agree with this article more. I grew up picking rock, bailing hay & working with animals. Countless times I'd come home with dust, alfalfa or straw everywhere (eyes, nose, clothes, etc). I worked with a lot of people and every member of the family worked as soon as you were able to lift something. What was odd was that you had entire families and not one of them would have allergies.
Now, I'm sure there are exceptions but I think that it would be an interesting survey to compare people who work in dirty grimy environments with people who work in corporate America. I spent my childhood running through the weeds, pulling wood ticks out of my hair and watching my mom put iodine all over my cuts & scrapes (hurts like a b*tch). Although by some people's standards I grew up in utter squalor, it was a lot of fun.
I have two cousins who moved to Minneapolis and grew up in a house with an air filtration system. The tiniest pollen or cat dander will send them into sneezing fits. Those air filtration systems are more harm than good in my opinion.
To my knowledge, I don't have any allergic reactions or hay fever. Now, this is just my personal experience but when I lived out in the country, I didn't know anyone except my teacher who had hay fever. Once I went to college at age 18, I met tons of people with hay fever. Is this correlation due to the fact that our childhoods were spent in filth or is it simply because people with allergies move away from those areas? I'm not sure but considering that allergies can "develop" later in life, I'm prone to believe that the less you are exposed to tiny particles, the more your body wigs out when your immune system encounters them.
If you're a parent, I would suggest getting your toddler/infant out to the park as often as possible and let them get some fresh air. Yes, it has smog & pollen in it but everyone has to deal with these their entire lives.
There's no analogy to be used here, it's just simply speculation. They've done this study with lab mice, now why don't they do a sampling of populations and ask people whether they work in an office with a controlled air system or outdoors/farm work where they're exposed to plants & animals daily.
The human body is extremely adaptive. Anti-bodies are perfect examples of an immune system being exposed to something and then being able to deal with it later. I speculate that if people aren't exposed to dust, pollen, dander, etc. then their bodies will have a much more difficult time discerning them from actually harmful foreign particles.
My work here is dung.
If you did, you'd see why I haven't been sick in 15 years.
"In my neighborhood no one ever got polio. No one, ever. You know why? 'Cause we swam in the East River. We swam in raw sewage! It strengthened our immune systems. The polio never had a prayer; we were tempered in raw shit!"
A good reason to give my fiancee for NOT cleaning my house every weekend... I'll tell her it's good for you!
The meek may inherit the earth, but the strong shall take the stars.
It will be no problem at all if there are moon colonies. But, as we all know there aren't (although some conspiracy theorists know there are).
Acting stupid isn't much fun when there's someone around who knows better
My mother was stricken with Polio in the early 50's, just a few years before the vaccine was approved.
Although I've never seen any literature that support this, she says Polio was known as a Middle-class disease, since the middle-class were more likely to have cleaner houses (thus not exposing babies to as many germs and developing healthy immune systems). The fact that her mother was a clean-freak before and after my mother was born may be coincidental to her contracting Polio, but I like to think they're related.
_______
2B1ASK1
There's an easy way!
"Powers. I have them."
If you want to fork out for the premium content you can get the full text here.
I'm presuming that in eight years time some other publication will 'discover' this again and maybe someone will link to me instead of Susan Taylor...
This is based mostly on BS, but interesting (at least to me) nonetheless...
When my mom was pregnant with me, at some point she had a bad case of poison ivy. I rarely ever get poison ivy, and if I do, it's only for a couple days, and is hardly noticable. My older sister on the other hand, is quite allergic to poison ivy, and generally needs medication to control it if she gets it. I've also heard of similar stories, but can't be arsed right now to remember them. Now, we all know that a baby's immune system is related to how good the mother's immune system is. I postulate that if a pregnant woman becomes infected with any sort of non-fatal/non-life-threating disease, bacteria, virus, the baby will, as a result, be more resistant to it, if not totally immune.
So, instead of isolating pregnant women from everything, I say we start giving them controlled infections of common sicknesses, so that their immune systems produce the atibodies, and pass them on to the baby.
Of course, I could just be completely insane....
Everything I say is a lie. Except that... and that... and that, and that, and that, and that... and that.
I've always had this point of view all my life. I'm latin american so it's very easy to contrast fellows from extreme opposite social backgrounds in any main avenue; from what Ive seen, people that grow up in shanty towns, with no vitamins, poor diets and other problems have by average stronger, agile and toughier body types than more fortunate individuals.
Kind of odd, but its not uncommon to read news about a young high profile kid die from an asthma fit. On the other side another one survives from four shots and a head crash in a hold up in some poor neighborhood.
I guess this is called survival of the fittest.
I often work inside a clean room, and once I saw a colleague of mine have a severe hay fever attack in there. Tears streamed from his eyes etc. He had to sit down for a while to recover. He told me it's the change of environment (in this case from dirty to clean air) that did it for him. Very strange.
-- Cheers!
Ever notice little kids who eat dirt are healthier looking and tend to be not as scrawny as the kids with clean-freaks for parents. Ever see a toddler allowed to play outside that didnt eat dirt ? They need the bacteria for their digestive system.
DONT TREAD ON ME MOÎΩN ÎABÃ
Do you realize that in addition to fluoridating water, why, there are studies underway to fluoridate salt, flour, fruit juices, soup, sugar, milk, ice cream? Ice cream, Mandrake? Children's ice cream!...You know when fluoridation began?...1946. 1946, Mandrake. How does that coincide with your post-war Commie conspiracy, huh? It's incredibly obvious, isn't it? A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual, and certainly without any choice. That's the way your hard-core Commie works.
http://www7.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0605/featur e4/index.html
The article is about allergies in specific, but is very relavant. A few researchers are claiming that because our environments are so sterile as children these days, more adults have allergies (and illness) as a result of not being exposed to certain elements (good or bad organisms, etc) as a child. Compelling read, I highly recommend it.
-Ponga
As I understand it, the immune-strengthening effect doesn't come from exposure to high concentrations of pathogens, but from ongoing low-level exposure: playing in the sandpit, swimming in the river, that kind of thing.
Paid Q&A/Research
...I have a personal counterpoint to some of them. I grew up doing a lot of the typical outside kid things, but still ended up with some pretty bad allergies to grass and other pollens. That doesn't mean I don't agree with the article - I think it's fairly intuitive that a too-clean environment results in a weaker immune system. Just saying that the reverse isn't guaranteed.
at Discover Magazine:p arasitesandpo264/
http://www.discover.com/issues/sep-93/features/of
It could also be that those with allergies tend to move away from the farms. I wouldn't last a week on a farm without some Zyrtec.
My sister and I grew up in the same environment. We lived in air conditioning, but spent most of our childhood playing outdoors in suburbs of Minneapolis. I have severe pollen-based allergies. If I do not have air conditioning or medication, I can wake up with my eyes glued shut from secretions, my throat can hurt like the worst strep throat you ever had, and my eyes and ears itch constantly. I am also mildly allergic to pretty much every food. My sister has no allergies of any kind.
My family was on the farm two generations ago, and one generation ago they still worked on the farm during the summer. Some of them have allergies, some don't.
My daughter's skin has reacted to certain foods since she was a baby.
So, I think there are probably genetic predispositions to allergies. However, I think there may be a role for environment in those who are less severely predisposed to allergies than the members of my family.
Reminds me of the Carlin bit:
"The Hudson River was loaded with raw sewage. That's right, we swam in raw sewage. You know, to cool off. And back then the big fear was polio. Thousands of kids every year were dying of polio. But you know what, in my neighborhood, nobody ever got polio. No one. Ever. You know why? BECAUSE WE SWAM IN RAW SEWAGE. It strengthened our immune system. The polio never had a chance. We were tempered in raw shit.
What are you going to do when some super virus comes along that turns your vital organs into liquid shit? I'll tell you what you're gonna do. You're gonna get sick and you're gonna die and you're gonna deserve it because you're fuckin' weak and you have a fuckin' weak immune system."
Evidence and rational thought have very little impact on people who think things like
"the only good germ is a dead germ"
"bright lights deter crime"
"second hand smoke is dangerous"
"criminals prefer machine guns"
in the end, people don't like scary and/or icky things and demand that "something" be done about them, even if "something" makes the problem worse instead of better.
Clear, Dark Skies
To think that I've had the 5 second rule backwards all these years... Note to self: let food sit on the floor for more than 5 seconds before picking it up.
Hobby Robotics
Since their users haven't had to develop antivirus instincts, are they more susceptable to a catastrophic plague in the future?
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
And you're not the first one to notice that. There's a significant concern that because Mac users aren't in the habit of virus paranoia that they are setting themselves up for a very, very big fall.
Clear, Dark Skies
I cna't say I agree with this article. I grew up in a mid atlantic state in the 80s. Our house had no a/c, so I was exposed to dust and pollen from the outdoors year round, plus I was outside playing a lot. Mom was a pretty busy person, so things like dusting and vacuuming weren't as regular as they were in other people's houses. I've been stuffed up my whole life and this past year I was tested for allergies, it turns out I am allergic to dust, mold, and various tree pollens. Basically 3 things I have been exposed to my entire life.
Too much of a good thing will always be a bad thing. Just like how a little bit of dark chocolate is good for the heart, a lot is hardly good for the gut. You can't have it go both ways though. Personally, I'd rather Lysol bomb the house than share it with disease carrying bacteria.
I used to always spend all of my time outside, but then I grew up, and now I find myself in a cubicle all of the time. Apparently playing outside from the time I was 2 till probably late middle school years did nothing to prevent allgeries that I have now. I would say I have a predisposition toward them. I have relatives who have the same types of allergies and are sick at the same times as I am. Chances are, like everything else, allergies are a combination of genetics and environment.
Ever been to a geek's home? Or seen his workspace?
WE knew this all along! That's why we stay healthy during times when about half the company is sick. Like, say, during a football world championship.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
My wife is 9 months pregnant, due to pop any day now. This is our first, so we've been shopping for day care centers. It seems all they want to tell us about is how everything is desanitized constantly. Shoes are not worn into the rooms. Hands are washed immediately after entering the room. Surfaces are sprayed down every few minutes. Each toy is desanitized immediately after a kid puts it down.
I came out of the first tour and said to my wife, "it was great and the only concern I have is that it's too damn clean. My boy's going to need some dirt and filth." Not only are they hampering the kids' natural defenses, but they're also evolving the next uber-germ.
I've found that my animal allergies vary from animal to animal (within the same species). My previous cat would sometimes start me sneezing hard. Getting her saliva on me would trigger an especially bad reaction. My current cat however hasn't given me the slightest problem. I know my allergies are still there because they flare up around different cats or at animal shelters.
I have some doubts about the dirt hypothosis beyond just animal allergies. I also grew up playing in the woods and being outdoors a lot. I also camp and hike a lot and drink straight out of (clean) streams. I still get bad reactions to many pollens. Maybe you have to have parasites or repeated infections as a child for this possible effect to show up.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
Intuitive: I figure your immune system is like anything else in your body -- if it doesn't get a regular workout it becomes less efficient and when you stress it, it may behave unpredictably.
Anecdotal: I grew up playing outside a lot. My favorite thing to do was hydraulic engineering on mud-puddles. I built dams, canals, locks with gates, stirred up mud to see how it behaved, etc. I was out in the woods a fair bit, got the occasional tick (this was before Lyme disease was such a concern, and as long as you caught the ticks the same day, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever was nothing to worry about). We had cats, our relatives had dogs, etc. To this day I have relatively little issue with allergies or illnesses of any kind. Yes, dust makes me sneeze, but it honestly puzzles me why people stampede to get flu shots every year -- I've had the flu maybe twice in my life, it sucked, it lasted about three days each time, and I got over it. People look at me like I'm nuts -- "You're not getting a flu shot? WHY NOT???"
On the other hand, just about all the people I know with allergies, constant colds, etc. are the ones with a horror of anything that might be less than perfectly fresh and germ-free. I drink milk that's a few days past the sell-by, I eat stuff that's been in the fridge a couple days, I have lunch at greasy spoons where the kitchen staff maybe doesn't wash their hands every time they touch their own face. I don't go out of my way to find "dangerous" food or items, but neither do I avoid things that may have tiny amounts of "harmful" stuff on them like my life is at risk every time I eat a sandwich.
Logical: I won't use antibacterial soaps unless there's no alternative. Why? Because using them indiscriminately breeds resistant bacteria. This is just logic backed up by known scientific observation of microbial evolution. It's the reason your doctor won't (or at least, shouldn't) prescribe you antibiotics every time you have a fever -- if it's not bacterial, the drugs wouldn't do you any good and would breed resistance in bacteria that aren't causing you any issues yet. Then those resistant strains would take over and now you have a problem, and it's a tough problem because the doctor has to give you massive doses, or use a different antibiotic -- and there are only so many antibiotics out there. Trying to sterilize the environment is the same thing on a grander scale.
If more parents let their kids go ahead and, for example, chew on the cat's tail, the kid's immune system would get exposed to a few new agents (and learn to deal with them), and the cat would swat the kid who would then learn "don't chew on kitty, it hurts". That's two problems solved. Don't let them play in raw sewage, but don't keep them in a plastic bubble either.
-- Old Man Kensey
Your attempt at tieing this article to some sort of anti-Western movement goes nicely with your otherwise misinformed position.
Suggesting that "antibodies" inherited from out mother is the same thing as developing our own immune response is well... just totally simplistic.
If I do get sick, at least I'll live. More people die in developing countries from things we can easily remedy than the other way around.
Hopelessly facile argument. The point of the article was that auto-immune disorders (which generally don't kill you outright) are a largely Western affliction because our immune systems have not been properly calibrated. Were you to get Crohn's disease (largely Western) you would live on, sure, but you'd have diarrhea for the rest of your life and some fun stomache pains. People with Crohn's disease have been successfully treated by deliberately giving them pig whipworm eggs.. once the immune system sees a *real* threat (real to the immune system, pig whipworms can't reproduce inside us) it eases up on inflaming the intestines.
Furthermore, it has been demonstrated that kids that grow up with pets, like a dog, have less of a chance of developing allergies then those that don't.
Please get a clue before you start posting drivel like the above. "anti-Western rhetoric" sheesh. paranoid?
CommentBot 0.7a running with args "-module irritate,disagree -target random"
You'll have a much harder time even dealing with being sick. I used to clean house for a student optometrist with two kids. She made her kids change clothes four or five times a day, wash the second they even got dirty, and I swear they must've taken four or five baths a day. We were only allowed to use Lysol, Pine Sol, Alcohol, and Acetone for cleaning around her house. She wanted it "STERILE." I told her her kids would grow up having problems. Guess what? The elest isn't even 5 years old now, and he's got practically NO immune system - he's stuck in a bubble now, most likely due to her insisting upon everything being 100% sterile.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
I don't think it is anti-western rhetoric... they are not advocating a return to 19th century living by the 1st world.
I think this is the reaction to anti-microbial everything for children. Kids aren't allowed to play outside unsupervised in the dirt anymore (many kids aren't allowed to play outside anymore). Soaps, baby toys, etc., all comtain special anti-microbial materials. Super antiseptic sprays are a hot seller... and no-one eats anything raw or unpasterized before.
The over-protective parents who make sure their children are not exposed to anything are probably doing more harm than good!
I read this in a recent issue of Science News but the link is only reachable by subscibers (20060610 issue). Here's another link: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=1993859.
The entire premise is flawed because there is no such thing as overly hygienic.
No, the premise is not flawed. Antibodies are produced in response to a threat so if there is no threat there are no antibodies. That is why vaccines work by introducing a small amount of threat to your body.
Sure, if you grow up in a sealed bubble, you will likely lack antibodies for certain things. However, you will have antibodies passed onto you from your mother.
If your mother was raised in the same sealed bubble as you she wouldn't develop antibodies to pass onto you.
We already know that every living thing develops certain immunities/resistance in specific environments. People in certain countries develop resistance to many indigenous parasites, while vistors become seriously ill.
If I do get sick, at least I'll live. More people die in developing countries from things we can easily remedy than the other way around.
It depends on what pathogen infects you as to whether or not you will live. Due to the overuse of antibiotics we have created "superbugs" such as MRSA and VRE that are beginning to find there way into the general population.
This article is just more anti-western rhetoric suggesting that the west would be better off if we were dirtier and that we should apologize for being better off than someone else. We've already gone through our development and I'm thankful to have benefitted from it.
The article isn't anti-western, it's anti-shortsightedness. What benefits you today may not benefit the generations that follow you tomorrow.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
I don't react to poison whatever either. My brother was the same way for years and years, but eventually developed a sensitivity to it. His doctor said that erratic large exposure to allergens can eventually produce sensitivity.
So don't seek it out and show off like I did.
Man, you really need that seminar!
move to new jersey.
When I first started highschool I had to start waking up at six in the morning rather than sleeping in. The first half of that school year was hell - I had the same flu three times in a row, I just couldn't fight it off. I caught every virus I was exposed to. I even started having problems with some foods. Things got better as my body got more used to the sleep cycle.
It seems to be a ubiquitous misconception that "clean" means somehow pure.
What we call "clean" often means, "covered in cleaning chemicals", or perhaps "free from stuff that is alive or was recently alive, like bacteria, house dust, cat hair etc.", or just "free from visible dirt".
I think it's fairly common knowledge (though apparently not on slashdot) that perfumes and other chemicals are a common cause of allergies.
So therefore it is more likely that it is the paranoid housewife's love of agressive chemical cleaners with 'lovely' fragrant perfumes, that causes allergies in those clean city homes.
Regarding the clean room discussion - the term is also misleading: clean rooms are usually a type of laboratory, and so contain all manner of chemicals. They are usually only a low dust (or airborne particle) environment. I myself worked in a clean room, where we used nasty solvents (chloroform, benzene) for cleaning apparatus and dissolving chemicals. It would be no surprise to me if someone entering there had an allergy attack.
My mum thought she had asthma or similar, because she would wheeze when we opened the kitchen window. The she cleared out some cupboards and threw away a load of old household cleaning solvent bottles, and the wheezing went away. The draft from the window had been wafting the solvent vapours over to the kitchen table.
Of course, a subject like this is rarely black and white, and I am sure the argument about exposure to microbes has merit (I myself have had a bout of colitis, and was at one point was tempted by the worms treatment)
You mean this study? It seems to say tobacco smoke is a Class A carcinogen. Apparently, only 160,440 people in the USA died of lung cancer last year though. That means that 1.8% of all deaths from lung cancer are directly caused by second hand smoke. Then there are the 35,000 to 40,000 deaths per year from heart disease due to second-hand smoke. Of course, if you're willing to murder 3000 people per year for a habit, what's another few thousand?