A New View of the Old Cold— As Sugars Go Up, Hypersensitivity Drops
Highlights of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology MeetingThe old bromide, "starve a fever, feed a cold," probably is sound medical advice, a Canadian professor told the experimental biology meeting.Vincent Witold Adamkiewicz, PhD, associate professor of physiology at the University of Montreal, said that a "cold" in the old days involved running noses, teary eyes and headaches that as often as not were the signs of a hypersensitivity reaction towards pollens, dust or certain foods.His studies show that immediate hypersensitivities in experimental animals depend on the amount of sugars in their body fluids. When the sugars are increased the hypersensitivity reactions are decreased. When sugar is decreased, the reaction is increased. Therefore, to avoid hypersensitivity reactions, sugars in the body fluids should be kept high by feeding well, he said.The two