Adults catch, on average, three to four common colds per year. Children catch a few more, some as many as one per month. This makes it probably the most common spreadable disease on the planet. A cold can take you out of work for three to four days, and make you miserable for about a week. What is the common cold?
The common cold is infection by any one of a large number of closely related viruses, most commonly the rhino-virus. These viruses enter the body through the nose or eyes, incubate and spread in the back of the sinuses for about three to four days, and then succumb to the immune system’s response to destroy it.
The symptoms include runny nose, sneezing, sore throat, coughing, and a variety of other general symptoms like headache and soreness. About 36 hours after the initial infection, symptoms appear, and these last two to three days at full strength before tapering off within about a week. While many of the symptoms of the common cold are similar to influenza, the two are very different diseases; a fever is a reliable indicator for influenza, as cold viruses do not cause this raise in body temperature. Cold viruses are not normally considered dangerous, with only about one in one million colds resulting in death, usually in the extremely young and extremely elderly.
The virus is spread most commonly by hand-to-hand contact between the recipient and an infected person. Another common method of infection is through inhalation of the virus in an area where an infected person has coughed or sneezed within the preceding three to four hours. The infected person is contagious only for about the first 3 days of infection; note, however, that they aren’t showing symptoms until one to two days after infection, so once the symptoms show, there is only a brief period where the are contagious, about one to two days.
There is really nothing that can be done to prevent catching colds, other than to limit contact with infected persons (it’s hard to tell who’s infected, though), and proper hand washing. Studies have shown that “proper”, in this case, simply means good scrubbing; germicidal and anti-bacterial soaps are basically ineffective against rhino-virus.
If you catch a cold, there are no substances or drugs you can take that drastically changes the results. The real goal in treating a cold is just reducing discomfort: use an anti-histamine or cough syrup if it makes you feel better, or just ride it out if you prefer. Because the viruses mutate so quickly, immunization is not practical. Antibiotics only kill bacteria, not viruses, so treating a cold with antibiotics is actually counter-productive, as it creates stronger bacteria within your body that are more likely to be immune to the next round of treatment you may require (see Antibiotic Overuse for more on this topic).
One interesting note: the common cold responds to placebo. This means that if you honestly believe a treatment will work, it will likely reduce the severity of symptoms for you. This may be why traditional medicines (echinacea, for instance) and other common remedies (such as chicken soup) appear to be effective to many people, when studies have shown that these actually have no significant effect on the symptoms of a cold in most people. Vitamin C does reduce incidence of the common cold in highly stressed people, and can reduce the length of symptoms by about a day, but even this remedy is only partially effective and does not significantly aid most people.
Take a few days off work, rest, and eat your soup. You’ll get over your cold soon enough.
Resources:
- Common Cold [www.nlm.nih.gov]
- Common Cold [en.wikipedia.org]
- Common Cold [www.commoncold.org]
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From the editor
I would like to add a new section to this newsletter: one week a month, I’d like to include a healthy recipe for a snack, a meal, a dessert, or drink. I’d like these submissions to come from my readers, so that we can all benefit from each others’ suggestions and ideas. I think it will be a lot of fun to try out new smoothie flavors or hear what others use for snacks to get through the day.
What makes a recipe healthy? The things you’ve been reading about here in the past: high in nutritional value, low in junk; high in fruits and vegetables, low in fatty foods; high in fiber, low glycemic index; you get the idea. Of course, I’ll decide whether to give the final stamp of approval to any submission, but I will fully credit you for your idea (don’t worry, I will give credit only by first name and city/country, no other information will be published).
Send me something good to eat! I look forward to trying out every idea I receive!
Healthy thoughts,
Jeff
