Comments on: Lifestyle Deficiencies and Metabolic Health: “It’s the Metabolism, Stupid”

By: George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet

George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 18:32:14 +0000

The disease will have adapted – if it is of long-standing and/or high mutagenicity (which is not the case with all infectious diseases) – to be optimally exploitative (to spread effectively without too much host harm) in a given environment.
For example, HCV evolved to deplete selenium for host epigenetic purposes, if it spreads to a population where selenium status is unusually low it will become more pathogenic.

By: David Koski

David Koski — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 22:39:19 +0000

Arm chair scientist that I am. I figure I may as well mention my simplistic understanding of pathogenic ecology. A disease, be it viral or bacterial, as deadly as it can become, somehow “knows” not to completely kill of the host or the at least the whole tribe. The would render the symbiotic relationship moot. So the complex involvement between diseases and their hosts has significant ingredients of time and location. Old Worlders crossing the Atlantic and exposing the New Worlders would abrogate this relationship

By: George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet

George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 11:10:22 +0000

It occurs to me that when I was younger I completely misunderstood the first contact immunity differential. I assumed that the relative lack of immunity of isolated peoples was due to the lack of some genetic adaptation caused by generations of exposure that protected the explorers.
Actually, what protected the explorers, was the fact that many of them had already survived the diseases. They had a high rate of immunity and also some benefit of herd immunity. Once a disease like smallpox jumped to an isolated native population there were no immune individuals to avoid infection and therefore limit its spread.
On the other hand, some infectious illnesses such as tuberculosis have long been associated with malnutrition and treated with improvements in diet. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19391442
Think of all the artists writers and composers who died of TB – none were able to, or choose to, eat well.

By: Go Kaleo

Go Kaleo — Fri, 25 Jan 2013 18:54:29 +0000

George, just wanted to stop in and say thanks for your thoughtful posts, you’ve given me some things to think about and a direction for future research and blogging.

By: George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet

George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 07:28:38 +0000

Thanks Dave, it was just a question. I was listening to a radio program about the smallpox epidemic decimating Maori in NZ in 1913 and thought, “that seems a bit late if it’s just about immunity”.

So I wondered what the story was elsewhere.
Smallpox of course was a lethal disease for Europeans in 1500s, by 1800s and colonisation of NZ a large % of Europeans would have been vaccinated with cowpox.
This might have been what delayed the NZ epidemic, and may have made a difference in Western North America, which was settled relatively late.

The 1491 book looks interesting. I really enjoyed Prescott’s two histories “The Conquest of Mexico” and “The Conquest of Peru” when I was younger. I will look for this at the library.

By: David Koski

David Koski — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 08:47:08 +0000

This is a reply to George @ the Hight Fat Hep C Diet write:
“Major smallpox epidemics among native peoples, for example, in USA and NZ seem to have occurred subsequent to colonial transitions, not at first exposure.”

According to what I have read, “subsequent” was not an issue. I would like some clarification.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1491:_New_Revelations_of_the_Americas_Before_Columbus

excerpt part one:

“The Inca Empire collapsed because by the time Europeans arrived, smallpox and other epidemics had already swept through cities, due both to population density and mostly to the natives’ lack of immunity to Eurasian diseases.”

I could do more research and I respect George @HFHCD, but I do think that much of the Native Americans died preceding the second wave of Old World arrivals

By: George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet

George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 19:21:24 +0000

Well interferons stimulate gut sensitivity to gliadin, which is why gluten sensitivity is often a post-viral phenomenon. Conceivably an adaptation with weaker interferon response would be more tolerant of gluten, but susceptible to some pathogens or cancers.
An interesting anthropological question is whether western diseases decimated newly colonized peoples before or after these were affected by new foods or food shortages, and if so, which diseases were diet-dependent and which spread independently of nutritional factors.
Major smallpox epidemics among native peoples, for example, in USA and NZ seem to have occurred subsequent to colonial transitions, not at first exposure.
But this is a subject that deserves a careful review, and may tell us something fundamental about the interaction of diet and immunity.

By: Diana

Diana — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 13:20:29 +0000

“Also, to adapt to one thing often has costs in terms of another.”

Interesting insight. In fact I would change the word “often” to “always.”

But I don’t agree with you about gluten, unless you can be more specific. We are all immunosuppressed (or perhaps immuno-challenged might be a better word for it) in some form or fashion. Just take a look at the 1918 “Spanish flu” epidemic. Or any flu epidemic. A novel virus comes up and….

By: Go Kaleo

Go Kaleo — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 04:48:43 +0000

Maybe. I’m keeping my sourdough though.

By: George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet

George @ the High Fat Hep C Diet — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 04:27:14 +0000

Also, to adapt to one thing often has costs in terms of another.
Adapting to malaria selects genes for sickle-cell anaemia, thallesaemia, favism. Adapting to gluten, for example, might involve an element of immunosupression that renders us more vulnerable to the next plague.