I know this may sound silly. But, why has no one cured the common cold?

[RichUK]

Ok, so my ignorance on the subject has prevailed. But I was thinking with all the technological advances etc etc. Why such a common bug has not been already remedied.

I?ve got a cold right now

 

[f95toli]

Because it does not exist

"The commond cold" is not a disease, it is just a name which covers a whole range of viral infections (e.g prably hundreds of different rhinoviruses) which result in more or less similar symptoms.
You are already immune to many of those strands but since viruses can mutate very quickly there is always a new strand around which our immune systems have not adapted to yet.

 

[Qriz]

That's pretty much right on. There is an enourmous amount of viruses with similar effects (runny nose, sneezing, coughing, etc.) If you get one and don't die, you become immune to that specific one. But there are hundreds, maybe thousands and those little guys tend to mutate. Mutate a lot faster than we can make vaccines etc. So you're exposed quite often to a strand that your body hasn't encountered yet.

 

[XJustMeX21]

spot on its not the same virus or they could cure it, its many many different ones that mutate all the time.

 

[Gibsons]

There are cures and there are vaccines....

As pointed out above, there are pehaps thousands of different viruses that can cause a cold - immunizing against all of them is impractical and/or impossible. A thousand vaccines shots would be worse than any cold...

Which brings us to the problem of treating an infection after it's started. Most of the antiviral drugs we have aren't that good. After massive amounts of research, we've come up with a long term multidrug regimen that just holds HIV at bay. Herpes virus infections are treated with acyclovir which only lessens the symptoms of the recurrent cold sores - the cold sores re-occur and the infection is lifelong no matter how much acyclovir you take. The influenza antiviral drugs only shorten the course of the disease by a day or so. You still get sick, and your immune system is still what does the job of clearing the infection.

Why don't we have better drugs? Well... it's just hard. Many viruses can go into latency (bascially a dormant state - HIV and herpes do this) and while they're dormant it's diffiult to simply imagine how a drug might work against them. Most cold viruses however are lytic (don't go into latency). It's still pretty difficult to to get a good drug againt them, because much of what they do is simply hijack host machinery. It's more difficult to make drug that specific for the virus rather than the host. There are fewer targets, and, due to mutation rates, the targets move around pretty fast. It's a lot easier with bacteria.

 

[DrPizza]

What they said ^^^

"The" common cold is actually 100's of different colds. The only thing "common" about them are the symptoms.

 

[Ryoga]

Also note that the symptoms of a cold are defenses imposed by your body or the consequenses of those defenses. This is why they show up all the time. It's just how your body fights back.

1. Mucous traps and kills invaders, so your body produces extra mucous to trap and kill any invaders in the nose or throat. Mucous running down the back of your throat makes is sore. This effect is one of many that get triggered by histamine.

2. Infections that attack the human body like the same type of homeostatis that the human body provides. That should be self-evident. That means that common invaders love normal human body temperature. Since very slight changes in temperature make cellular functioning mess up, your body purposefully raises the temperature level of the body (fever) in order to make the body more hostile to invaders.

3. Aches and pains, including headaches, are generally caused by changes in fluid levels in the body. Many of the emergency signals your body uses, like histamine, cause fluids to migrate out of cells and into the blood vessels. Lymph nodes that produce antibodies also swell since they are active, and they become tender. Your body also begins to flush garbage more frequently, making your spleen, kidneys, liver, bladder, and intestines work harder. All this fluid migration makes your body dehydrate faster and desalinate faster, which is the main reason why it's so important to drink fluids when you're sick. The more you drink the more flushing your body can do. If it runs low on fluids your body will stop flushing at sick levels, so toxin levels and dead cells can build up, generally making your body less happy.

4. Lack of appetite and lack of energy occur because your body has diverted energy from normal taks like digesting food and moving to the tasks of fighitng the illness.

Feeling sick is actually a good thing. People with compromised immune systems don't feel sick. They just get weaker and weaker as the infection attacks their body and inflicts damage.

 

[Calin]

One reason why the common cold hasn't been eradicated is that, unlike other viruses, the common cold mutate very quickly. There are usually a couple or more of new "branches" of common cold which are deemed dangerous (as in able to create an epidemy). The vaccines are usually created for those two-three branches.
Now, the vaccines are just little pills - and if the masterminds at disease control happen to guess the virus branches that will hit the land in winter, those who took the vaccines will be safe. If they don't guess the branch that hits, everyone is just as weak against them as without a vaccine.

 

[alpha88]

Because it's hard to cure viruses.

 

[glugglug]

When was the last time anything was cured?

In today's political environment, it can't possibly happen. The medical industry lobbies are too big. If things were actually cured, they couldn't make so much money on office visits, pain relievers, decongestants, etc.

Anyone who came up with a cure would be executed. It is similar to the reason that we don't have 200mpg cars.

 

[Gibsons]

Originally posted by: glugglug
When was the last time anything was cured?

In today's political environment, it can't possibly happen. The medical industry lobbies are too big. If things were actually cured, they couldn't make so much money on office visits, pain relievers, decongestants, etc.

Anyone who came up with a cure would be executed. It is similar to the reason that we don't have 200mpg cars.

Does someone else want to take this? I haven't had my coffee yet.

 

[Xyo II]

Originally posted by: Gibsons

Originally posted by: glugglug
When was the last time anything was cured?

In today's political environment, it can't possibly happen. The medical industry lobbies are too big. If things were actually cured, they couldn't make so much money on office visits, pain relievers, decongestants, etc.

Anyone who came up with a cure would be executed. It is similar to the reason that we don't have 200mpg cars.

Does someone else want to take this? I haven't had my coffee yet.

Ignore it and it will go away

 

[wwswimming]

maybe the common cold has a purpose.

maybe God doesn't want it cured.

maybe i should have a second cup of coffee.

 

[Peter]

Originally posted by: wwswimming

maybe the common cold has a purpose.

Yes it does: Weed out the weakest individuals for the next round of human evolution.

maybe God doesn't want it cured.

Maybe it's the virii evolving too fast for human science, securing their own survival (of the fittest).

maybe i should have a second cup of coffee.

Good move.


Can open. Worms everywhere

 

[Gibsons]

Okay, I had my coffee...

Originally posted by: glugglug
When was the last time anything was cured?

Not sure about the most recent time, but a recent example would be stomach ulcers.

In today's political environment, it can't possibly happen. The medical industry lobbies are too big.

Yes, it can. The medical industry lobbies don't control what non-profit research institutions do. It seems you're claiming the medical industry lobbies control or suppressing research. How do they do this, specifically? Is this worldwide, or just in the U.S.?

If things were actually cured, they couldn't make so much money on office visits, pain relievers, decongestants, etc.

"They?" How does a virologist make money off of office visits, pain releivers and decongestants?

A cure for the common cold would be worth billions.

Not to mention the incentive for the individual researcher of world-wide fame and recognition.

Anyone who came up with a cure would be executed.

More like they might be up for a Nobel prize.

You seem to think that an obstacle to medical research is motive. As if researchers simply *wanted* to invent a cure, we'd have one. I know several virologists. They'd all trade their left nut (or ovary, as the case may be...) for a simple cure to viral infections. None of them make a dime from the pharmaceutical industry. Heck, they don't make a whole lot of money, period. A cure for the common cold (or cancer, or whatever) would make them rich and famous. What's their incentive to NOT invent this cure? Is the pharmaceutical industry paying all of them off?

And if it's simply a matter of motive, why don't YOU invent the cure? Nobody's paying you off, are they?

It is similar to the reason that we don't have 200mpg cars.

No, that's mostly the laws of thermodynamics.

 

[ahurtt]

Because it is caused by a virus and is therefore not susceptible to common treatments like penicillin which kill bacteria. Viruses are much hardier and resilient organisms that are much harder to kill than bacteria. Kinda like the reason there isn't any cure for AIDS. You've probably heard of things like anti-bacterial soap and probably have some in your house. But ever wonder why there isn't anything called "anti-viral" soap?

 

[dkozloski]

Originally posted by: glugglug
When was the last time anything was cured?

In today's political environment, it can't possibly happen. The medical industry lobbies are too big. If things were actually cured, they couldn't make so much money on office visits, pain relievers, decongestants, etc.

Anyone who came up with a cure would be executed. It is similar to the reason that we don't have 200mpg cars.

You can find all sorts of testimonial letters for conspiricies, crop circles, oil additives, 200mpg carburetors, cures of the common cold, alien abductions, and astrology. Unfortunately they all seem to be written by the same people.

 

[glugglug]

Originally posted by: Gibsons
Not sure about the most recent time, but a recent example would be stomach ulcers.

Ulcer's haven't been cured yet, I had them 3 years ago. Antibiotics get rid of the Helicobacter pylori bacteria that causes some ulcers but not nearly all (in fact some can be caused by the antibiotics). And antibiotics aren't exactly a recent development.

Yes, it can. The medical industry lobbies don't control what non-profit research institutions do. It seems you're claiming the medical industry lobbies control or suppressing research. How do they do this, specifically? Is this worldwide, or just in the U.S.?

Mostly the U.S, although present in some other places as well. If a cure is released, you can count on 2 things:

1. It will probably come from a nation with socialized medicine.
2. Our FDA won't approve it for at least 30-40 years.

 

[bwanaaa]

Viruses are DNA sequences that hijack the cellular machinery-several approaches have been successful in the lab

1) antisense DNA/RNA to hybridize in vivo with the viral strand. Effectively swamping out the free viral information and 'conjugating it' thus tying it up and preventing processing of information. If the antisense strands could be delivered (in viral particles?) and then made to become covalently active-the virus would be stopped dead in its tracks

2)prevent the viral particles from binding. This requires identification of the binding sites and the mechanism of internalization of the virus. Interestingly, we have only just developed a microscope that allows this on the nanometer scale so further advances in cell biology should be forthcoming.

 

[Gibsons]

Originally posted by: glugglug

Originally posted by: Gibsons
Not sure about the most recent time, but a recent example would be stomach ulcers.

Ulcer's haven't been cured yet, I had them 3 years ago. Antibiotics get rid of the Helicobacter pylori bacteria that causes some ulcers but not nearly all (in fact some can be caused by the antibiotics). And antibiotics aren't exactly a recent development.

For a vast number of people, they have been cured. These people are no longer buying the antacids and proton pump inhibitor drugs that make so much money for the evil drug companies. Why didn't the medical industry assassinate Marshall and Warren for their discovery?

To dismiss the discovery and treatment by saying antibiotics aren't new is ridiculous. The discovery was significant enough to warrant a Nobel. Is the Nobel foundation part of the conspiracy too?

Yes, it can. The medical industry lobbies don't control what non-profit research institutions do. It seems you're claiming the medical industry lobbies control or suppressing research. How do they do this, specifically? Is this worldwide, or just in the U.S.?

Mostly the U.S, although present in some other places as well. If a cure is released, you can count on 2 things:

1. It will probably come from a nation with socialized medicine.
2. Our FDA won't approve it for at least 30-40 years.[/quote]

Why did you edit out most of my post and only answer one of my questions (and poorly at that)?

Where's the evidence of this conspiracy? Is there so much as one shred?

If ithe conspiracy is mostly in the U.S. why haven't researchers in China, Japan, Russia, Europe etc. come up with a cure? They have a lot of scientists, every bit as smart as scientists anywhere else. What's holding them back?

How is the medical industry suppressing discovery of a cure by independent non-profit researchers?

If there's a drug that cures the common cold, who's going to sell it?

I know a pretty fair amount of virology - I've worked in virology labs, collaborated with virologists, play golf with a virologist and give lectures on virology pretty regularly.... why don't I come up with a cure? Why do I see it as being an extremely difficult biological problem rather than a conspiracy? If I'm part of the conspiracy, where is my payoff?

And please, tell me - why don't YOU come up with the cure? All you'd need is a few years training. Then do the trivial research needed to find the cure and you're a world-famous multi-millionaire. You have all the incentive anyone could ever need, what's holding you back?

 

[50cent1228]

no they can cure it but they don't want to release the cure because hundreds of company's like tynanol and advil and stuff are payin people to keep it secret so they would still make money

 

[ForumMaster]

we can't cure the common cold cause all the various viruses that fall into that catagory are RNA based meaning that they mutate very rapidly. as soon as we find a cure for one, they mutate just a little bit but enough to avoid that particular treatment. it's a constant race and one we may never win.

 

[DrPizza]

Originally posted by: ForumMaster
we can't cure the common cold cause all the various viruses that fall into that catagory are RNA based meaning that they mutate very rapidly. as soon as we find a cure for one, they mutate just a little bit but enough to avoid that particular treatment. it's a constant race and one we may never win.

Only one thing I want to point out about that - "they mutate to avoid..." implies some intelligence. It should be "they mutate and some mutations are beneficial to the virii, but not beneficial to us as our anti-virals/vaccinations do not protect against these new varieties.

 

[Calin]

Originally posted by: glugglug
When was the last time anything was cured?

In today's political environment, it can't possibly happen. The medical industry lobbies are too big. If things were actually cured, they couldn't make so much money on office visits, pain relievers, decongestants, etc.

Anyone who came up with a cure would be executed. It is similar to the reason that we don't have 200mpg cars.

There is no engine efficient enough in order to move a car (a ton or so of weight) with an average MPG of 200 (not yet at least). So, you must reduce both the mass of the vehicle, and its cross section.
A car running 200 miles with a gallon of fuel would be smaller than the VW Lupo, the 2-door Smart. A Mini would be huge compared to it.

 

[ktwebb]

Granny (of The Beverly Hillbillies fame) cured the common cold years ago. Circa 1964. Her cure. Drink plenty of water, and get plenty of rest. Wait 5 to 10 days and without a doubt you'll be cured.