once again, "it is NOT the genes, stupid!"
http://www.newscientist.com/special/six-diseases-you-never-knew-you-could-catch
STRANGE INFECTIONS
Twentieth century medicine was phenomenally successful at developing vaccines and
Antibiotics to fight infectious diseases, taming ancient scourges such as smallpox, tuberculosis and typhoid. In the 1960s and 70s, the prevailing view was that all diseases caused by microorganisms would soon be conquered, leaving only those caused by genetics, unhealthy lifestyles or ageing.
That idea now seems naive, not least because of the rise in
Antibiotic resistance. And there's another reason that no one even considered back then. A growing number of diseases that were thought to be down to genetics or lifestyle turn out to have an infectious origin.
Take stomach ulcers. Long thought to be triggered by stress, it emerged in the 1980s that many cases are caused by a bacterium called Helicobacter pylori. Now a short course of
Antibiotics is all that's needed to cure the condition, and in the west stomach ulcers are on the decline.
Since then, researchers have unearthed the unexpected infectious origins of several other diseases. In some the explanation is unique, but in others common mechanisms are at work.
For example, several autoimmune diseases arise because infection with a microbe triggers an immune attack, which cross-reacts with similar molecules from the host, causing the immune system to attack human tissues. And several cancers may be caused by viruses, sometimes because they insert themselves into our DNA and disrupt the genes that usually stop cells multiplying out of control.
The idea that lifelong conditions such as type 1 diabetes and obesity could be caught as easily as a cold is spine-chilling. Yet it raises the tantalising possibility that they could be treated with
Antibiotics or antiviral drugs, or possibly even prevented with a vaccine. So which of the following illnesses will be next to go the way of stomach ulcers?
[see the pics at the link]
1.
Obesity
Adenovirus AD-36 could be partly responsible for human obesity (Image: Russell Knightley/SPL)
People may get fat because of their genes or because they eat too much, but there's a third possibility: catching the wrong kind of cold
2.
Diabetes
Coxsackie B4 virus is known for causing diarrhoea and vomiting but could also be responsible for diabetes (Image: CDC)
Stomach bugs are never pleasant, but for some they could trigger something nastier than diarrhoea and vomiting: diabetes
3.
Schizophrenia
Commonly found in cats,
Toxoplasma gondii could be a cause of schizophrenia (Image: Bsip Vem/SPL)
Cat lovers, take note: a
parasite that lurks in cat faeces could be linked with schizophrenia
4.
Breast cancer
Known to cause cancer in mice, mouse mammary tumour virus (MMTV) has now been linked to human
Breast Cancer (Image: Eye of Science/SPL)
Why some women get
Breast Cancer and others do not is a mystery - genes are to blame for only about 1 in 10 cases. Maybe the answer lies with the mouse mammary tumour virus
5.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Streptococcus bacteria could be partly responsible for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) (Image: S. Lowry/University of Ulster/Getty)
OCD has been linked to everything from genes to traumatic childhoods. But a small subset of cases may be triggered by infections
6.
Prostate cancer
Xenotropic murine leukaemia (XMRV) has been linked to prostate cancer (Image: A J Cann)
The link between prostate cancer and an infection is perhaps the weakest of all those here, but if confirmed it could lead to better screening techniques