[Health] The Infectious Diseases Thread

[RMC]

Did you have a neighborhood? Or maybe you were raised by the farm animals.

We had a township. At least it wasn't wolves like Hepcat.

[Lorini]

Started a political thread in R&P about Covid

[Sudy]

Saw a meme this morning... black and white text over the anthropomorphized illustration of a green bin (i.e. compostable recycling). Said something along the lines of, "Talked to my sanitation worker this morning. He said to wear gloves or wash your hands when touching your bins, because they handle over 2,000 each day and it could be a covid hotspot!!"



"Hotspot". Lol. Right... most of the people coming down with covid in your community touched your green bin handles.

#1, that's not how the vast majority of covid transmission has been shown to work. Sure; it can persist on surfaces. I wouldn't lick the hands of someone who'd touched 2,000 doorknobs. Definitely continue scrubbing your hands after you touch any shared surfaces outside your home. But it's a fraction as important as staying the hell away from other people and wearing a mask when you can't.

#2, what kind of monster doesn't wash their hands after touching their garbage/recycling bins, even during normal times?! Or is this just my mysophobia speaking?


I guess reminders that catch people's attention aren't a bad thing, but focusing on your recycling bin handles is misguided. I honestly wonder if half of these are created by people ironically to see how far they can get their aunts to spread them.

[Blackhawk]

#2, what kind of monster doesn't wash their hands after touching their garbage/recycling bins, even during normal times?! Or is this just my mysophobia speaking?

I live upstairs. Half of the time when I throw something out, it's on my way to the car to leave, so no, I don't wash my hands. Besides, trash doesn't normally touch the lid handles, and our trash trucks use robotic arms to dump them.

[Sudy]

But the point is that normal people think about these things. Anyone who doesn't, this meme probably isn't going to affect.

And for the record, when I'm taking out garbage on my way out, I use a piece of clean paper towel or other sanitary garbage (like toilet paper packaging) as a glove.

But yeah, even as a mild-to-moderate mysophobe, there are still times I'm traversing the city by public transit, am hungry, and say &#$@ it and eat a hot dog that I can't get into my mouth without touching. (Not to mention the state of some hot dog stands, but that's a matter for another post.)

[Ralph-Wiggum]

#2, what kind of monster doesn't wash their hands after touching their garbage/recycling bins, even during normal times?! Or is this just my mysophobia speaking?

[pr0ner]

#2, what kind of monster doesn't wash their hands after touching their garbage/recycling bins, even during normal times?! Or is this just my mysophobia speaking?

+1

[Isgrimnur]

#2, what kind of monster doesn't wash their hands after touching their garbage/recycling bins, even during normal times?! Or is this just my mysophobia speaking?

+1

+1

[Sudy]

Germs are real, guys. Or do robot arms operate your bathrooms too?

[Blackhawk]

Germs are real. We are constantly swimming in them, inhaling them, soaking in them, eating them, drinking them, brushing our teeth with them.

I pick and choose which germs to take extra precautions with. My trash can handles are subject to nothing but wind, rain, and sun, maybe some floating phloomph, but not so much more than anything else around the trash can that I feel the need to go to to extreme lengths to avoid them.

[coopasonic]

Germs are real, guys. Or do robot arms operate your bathrooms too?

I am the only one that touches my trash and recycling bin handles and I have an unimpaired immune system bolstered by raising two boys. I'm ok with a certain risk level.

[Sudy]

I'm mostly reacting with amusement, but I'm genuinely surprised... I was raised to equate garbage germs with bathroom germs. Though obviously, handling rinsed soda cans is different than touching multi-day-old trash that may have come into contact with, for example, raw poultry juices.

There are certainly places were I turn a blind eye or may be ignorant, and I understand basic immunology. But I didn't think I was so far outside the norm on this one.

[wonderpug]

Germs are real, guys. Or do robot arms operate your bathrooms too?

Look, there's nothing soap and water can do that a poorly constructed giant robot arm can't do.

[Sudy]

I am the only one that touches my trash and recycling bin handles and I have an unimpaired immune system bolstered by raising two boys. I'm ok with a certain risk level.

I'm talking about pathogens found in and near decaying organics though, not other people's hands on your bin handles.

[stessier]

Current estimates suggest the ratio of the number of bacteria cells to human cells in an adult male is around 1.3:1. Which raises all sorts of fun questions about who are you really and who is actually the one pulling the strings?

[ImLawBoy]

I usually wash my hands after taking out the trash. Our bins sit in the alley where they can be scurried on by rodents (more than once I've opened a bin and tossed a bag on a surprised rat), and the sanitation folks still have to move the bins to get them to the point where the mechanical arms can do their work. Plus, I always imagine the germs from the garbage itself working its way up and around the rest of the bin by some kind of germ magic. I'm far from a germaphobe, but it just seems like a good practice to wash my hands after handling garbage and garbage bins.

[Sudy]

Plus, I always imagine the germs from the garbage itself working its way up and around the rest of the bin by some kind of germ magic.

Yes, do not disqualify germ magic superstition. It is the buffer that will keep us safe.

[Blackhawk]

While I don't wash my hands just because I touched the trash bin (say, throwing away an empty cardboard box and an empty water jug), if I handled a bag I just took out of the kitchen, yeah, that's a washing. But that's washing because I was handling organic trash, not because I touched the bin.

[Ralph-Wiggum]

I would be more concerned if I were touching the inside of the trash bin than the outside, but even then I probably wouldn't think to wash my hands. The only real times I consistently wash my hands are after using the bathroom and after cleaning the cats' litter. My hope is that my laissez-faire attitude to handwashing all my life has made me unkillable.

[Lorini]

I usually wash my hands after taking out the trash. Our bins sit in the alley where they can be scurried on by rodents (more than once I've opened a bin and tossed a bag on a surprised rat), and the sanitation folks still have to move the bins to get them to the point where the mechanical arms can do their work. Plus, I always imagine the germs from the garbage itself working its way up and around the rest of the bin by some kind of germ magic. I'm far from a germaphobe, but it just seems like a good practice to wash my hands after handling garbage and garbage bins.

Same. There's tons of insects where I live as well, a little hand sanitizer goes a long way, which we have a lot of around the inside of the house.

[Anonymous Bosch]

Germs are real, guys.

Indeed, and you're lugging around three to five pounds of 'em right now, y'filthy degenerate!

How much bacteria do people carry around?

Enough to fill a big soup can. "That's three to five pounds of bacteria," says Lita Proctor, the program coordinator of the National Institutes of Health's Human Microbiome Project, which studies the communities of bacteria living on and in us. The bacteria cells in our body outnumber human cells 10 to 1, she says, but because they are much smaller than human cells, they account for only about 1 to 2 percent of our body mass—though they do make up about half of our body's waste.

The host of bacteria we carry around weren't well-cataloged until recently. In July 2011, at North Carolina State University, the Belly Button Biodiversity study found about 1,400 different strains of bacteria living in the navels of 95 participants. Of these, 662 strains were previously unrecognized.

[stessier]

Germs are real, guys.

Indeed, and you're lugging around three to five pounds of 'em right now, y'filthy degenerate!

How much bacteria do people carry around?

Enough to fill a big soup can. "That's three to five pounds of bacteria," says Lita Proctor, the program coordinator of the National Institutes of Health's Human Microbiome Project, which studies the communities of bacteria living on and in us. The bacteria cells in our body outnumber human cells 10 to 1, she says, but because they are much smaller than human cells, they account for only about 1 to 2 percent of our body mass—though they do make up about half of our body's waste.

The host of bacteria we carry around weren't well-cataloged until recently. In July 2011, at North Carolina State University, the Belly Button Biodiversity study found about 1,400 different strains of bacteria living in the navels of 95 participants. Of these, 662 strains were previously unrecognized.

That 10:1 ratio has been discredited. It's based on a 1972 estimation looking at the quantity in fecal matter and assuming the entire intestine is the same concentration when in reality the bateria on live in the much shorter colon. Article in Nature.

[Anonymous Bosch]

That 10:1 ratio has been discredited. It's based on a 1972 estimation looking at the quantity in fecal matter and assuming the entire intestine is the same concentration when in reality the bateria on live in the much shorter colon. Article in Nature.

Be that as it may, the relevant point here is that Sudy remains a bacteria-laden vessel of filthy degeneracy by design.

[hitbyambulance]

even as a mild-to-moderate mysophobe

my brother is this way. he is easily triggered and it's amusing to do so

[gbasden]

This reminds me of the old discussion about how often towels get washed, and the horror levels from the people who wash them daily at the people that wash them monthly.

I tend to fall under the "what doesn't kill me makes me stronger" philosophy, so I normally make a point of washing after I use the bathroom, before I cook, and if I had to touch something icky.

[Anonymous Bosch]

This reminds me of the old discussion about how often towels get washed, and the horror levels from the people who wash them daily at the people that wash them monthly.

I tend to fall under the "what doesn't kill me makes me stronger" philosophy, so I normally make a point of washing after I use the bathroom, before I cook, and if I had to touch something icky.

Indeed, to quote a professor of immunology and surgery at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and assistant professor of pediatrics in the op-ed they wrote for the NYT discussing the unintended immunological consequences of the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic:

Quarantine May Negatively Affect Kids’ Immune Systems

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the world is unwittingly conducting what amounts to the largest immunological experiment in history on our own children. We have been keeping children inside, relentlessly sanitizing their living spaces and their hands and largely isolating them. In doing so, we have prevented large numbers of them from becoming infected or transmitting the virus. But in the course of social distancing to mitigate the spread, we may also be unintentionally inhibiting the proper development of children’s immune systems….Immunological memory and tolerance learned during childhood serves as the basis for immunity and health throughout adulthood.

…

Memory T cells begin to form during the first years of life and accumulate during childhood. However, for memory T cells to become functionally mature, multiple exposures may be necessary, particularly for cells residing in tissues such as the lung and intestines, where we encounter numerous pathogens. These exposures typically and naturally occur during the everyday experiences of childhood — such as interactions with friends, teachers, trips to the playground, sports — all of which have been curtailed or shut down entirely during efforts to mitigate viral spread. As a result, we are altering the frequency, breadth and degree of exposures that are crucial for immune memory development.

While the immune system is influenced by multiple factors, including genetics and everyday exposures to family members and pets, the long term effects of removing the social system that brings children in contact with other people, places and things remains uncharted territory. However, there is now substantial evidence that antigen exposure during the formative period of childhood is important not only for protection but also for reducing the incidence of allergies, asthma and inflammatory diseases. A well-known theory, called the “hygiene hypothesis,” proposes that the increased incidence of allergies and other immune disorders involving inappropriate immune reactions across industrialized societies is a result of the move away from agrarian society toward a highly sanitized urban setting.

Failing to train our immune systems properly can have serious consequences. When laboratory mice raised in nearly sterile conditions were housed together in the same cage with pet mice raised in standard conditions, some of the laboratory mice succumbed to pathogens that the pet mice were able to fight off. Additional studies of the microbiome — the bacteria that normally inhabit our intestines and other sites — have shown that mice raised in germ-free conditions or in the presence of antibiotics had reduced and altered immune responses to many types of pathogens. These studies suggest that for establishing a healthy immune system, the more diverse and frequent the encounters with antigens, the better.

Clinical trials have already demonstrated the effect of antigen exposure or avoidance in early childhood on subsequent immune responses. Introduction of peanuts to infants resulted in reduced incidence of peanut allergy, while avoidance had the opposite effect of promoting unwanted, severe allergic immune responses to peanuts. These findings further suggest that exposure during the formative years is critical for developing an immune system that responds appropriately to pathogens while tolerating harmless antigens.

…

The sooner we can safely restore the normal experiences of childhood, interacting with other children and — paradoxically — with pathogens and diverse microorganisms, the better we can ensure their ability to thrive as adults in this changing world.

[Paingod]

Indeed, to quote a professor of immunology and surgery at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and assistant professor of pediatrics in the op-ed they wrote for the NYT discussing the unintended immunological consequences of the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic

If memory serves, there was a whole sci-fi show based around the concept of people living in space, in a sterile environment, being bad for them in the long run and children were dying because of it. Can't remember the name of it.

[Isgrimnur]

[pr0ner]

This reminds me of the old discussion about how often towels get washed, and the horror levels from the people who wash them daily at the people that wash them monthly.

I tend to fall under the "what doesn't kill me makes me stronger" philosophy, so I normally make a point of washing after I use the bathroom, before I cook, and if I had to touch something icky.

The only time I'm super diligent about washing my hands is after bowel movements and handling raw meat when cooking.

[Sudy]

I probably wash my towels and sheets less than most of you. I said I was afraid of germs... not that I wasn't too lazy to live among them.

I don't generally use antibacterial soap or hand sanitizer, even in covid times. I just tend to be hyper aware of what I've touched before I eat something or rub my finger in my eye. If you take out the trash and then touch your phone or keyboard without washing your hands, whatever may have been on the garbage is now on those other surfaces too. If your trash bins are super clean, that may not be a concern.

And yeah, I know there's MRSA on most people's phones regardless, and flushing the toilet sends poop particles flying everywhere. There's an admitted congnitive dissonance, or else we'd be paralyzed. I just try not to willfully infect myself after coming into contact with problem surfaces. Being sick sucks.

[hitbyambulance]

And yeah, I know there's MRSA on most people's phones regardless, and flushing the toilet sends poop particles flying everywhere. There's an admitted congnitive dissonance, or else we'd be paralyzed. I just try not to willfully infect myself after coming into contact with problem surfaces. Being sick sucks.

flush the toilet with the lid closed!

and if everyone did that, this would also effectively end the 'leaving the toilet seat up or down' arguments.

[Sudy]

Yeah, I've been doing that for a couple years now. Though of course now all I can think about is what's getting on the back of my shirt when I sit on the toilet....

[Z-Corn]

Ew, you don't poop naked? That's weird...

[Daehawk]

So doing a hand stand on the toilet with your head in the bowl when you flush so you can watch the swirl better is considered faux pas??

[Sudy]

Not around here, apparently....

[Blackhawk]

No cognitive dissonance here! I'm the type that prefers to see how the sausage is made. When I grab my toothbrush I don't avoid thinking about what's on it. I just acknowledge it, recognize that it's out of my hands, and brush away.

[Defiant]

A new study shows coronavirus may actually hide in the brain, where it could reactivate down the road.

“It’s hard for a virus to hide in your lungs. It’s much easier for the virus to hide in your central nervous system,” said Kumar.

Signs of this are evident with loss of taste and smell common in people infected with COVID-19. That is an attack on the central nervous system through the brain.

The GSU team monitored the diverse symptoms in the mice and noted brain infection mostly caused their death, not lung infection. They believe this can also be true in certain human cases.

https://www.wsbtv.com/news/local/new-st ... XR2QY5BEE/

[pr0ner]

Ew, you don't poop naked? That's weird...

Not when I poop at work, no.

[Z-Corn]

Ew, you don't poop naked? That's weird...

Not when I poop at work, no.

While I am a firm believer in the old adage, "The boss makes a dollar, I make a dime so I poop on company time." I am blessed to work "on the road" so I just go home when so moved. Bowel moved that is...

[Smoove_B]

In non-COVID-19 news:

I would attribute the huge drop in flu cases (e.g., https://cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm) not just to masks, but also distancing, avoiding crowds, improving ventilation, handwashing. I'm willing to bet that mechanism of transmission is very similar between flu and COVID-19.

Absolutely astounding to see this.