The Common Cold—Its Etiology and Treatment
The following is a transcription of the September 1957 issue of Dr. Royal Lee’s Applied Trophology newsletter, originally published by Standard Process Laboratories.
Also in this issue:
- Tip of the Month (Celery Root)
- Defeatism Hampers Multiple Sclerosis Fight
- Auto Accidents Causing Whip Injury to Neck
- What Is the Professional Attitude?
- High Points of Potassium Bicarbonate and Pneumotrophin PMG
The Common Cold—Its Etiology and Treatment
(See the April 1958 issue of Applied Trophology for the supplementary article “Histamine: The Toxic Factor in Colds and Allergy.”)
Science tells us that the common cold is a viral infection, but that is a poor substitute for more specific information. A specific virus is known to cause disease conditions as diverse as fever blisters, smallpox, cancer, and poliomyelitis. So maybe the real cause is malnutrition, because the fever blister virus (herpes simplex) is not capable of inflicting its vengeance on us unless our bloodstream becomes depleted in calcium bicarbonate—secondarily to sunburn, low calcium diet, or calcium precipitation by reason of alkalosis or from the excessive use of refined sugar. (Even Shakespeare attributed fever blisters to candy eating.*)
Burnet says the only race ever tested that failed to show the herpes simplex virus is the Greenland Eskimo. Babies are born free of the virus but become infected during childhood, so that at age forty about half the population is infected. In some adult groups, over 90 percent are found to have herpes antibody. It never is eliminated once it gains access to the body. It simply waits for the victim to become susceptible—by reason of malnutrition—to break out and can cause serious trouble, such as stomatitis in infants or encephalitis in rabbits; it is suspected of causing encephalitis in human subjects at times.1
Vitamin F and calcium lactate are specific remedies, it seems. The common cold virus is most effective in disabling the victim, however, and the reason seems to be that it systemically releases histamine from the tissues—as distinguished from local histamine release by other agents such as herpes virus, hay fever antigens, etc. The histamine then acts in its specific and definite way to give us the respiratory irritation, the body pains, the headaches, and other discomforts of the common cold.
That is why antihistaminic drugs may act favorably. It also gives us a clue as to the nature of the biochemical background of the cold syndrome. Histamine is known to be released only when an antibody has reacted with an antigen, the resulting combined protein being disposed of by tissue enzymes. In all probability all allergic reactions are of this origin, examples of irritation from histamine released upon entrance into the body of foreign proteins to which an inordinate sensitivity has been created through previous contact. (This hypersensitivity is suspected to be due to an over-alkaline state of the body—see Applied Trophology, Vol. 1, No. 2.)
But in the case of the common cold, where is the trigger that sets off the reaction? Many have “caught” a cold by exposure to undue chills, to being caught in a rain, etc., yet others are relatively immune.
To find the explanation, let us look to the possible source of potential histamine, the antigen-antibody reserves that are waiting to get together. We have in our connective tissues such a reserve of antigen: the natural tissue antigens that represent the cell blueprints, there to guide repair and regeneration of adjacent cells (Protomorphology, p. 167).2
We know that natural tissue antibody is present in the blood.3 We know that thyroid hormone is released upon the stimulus of cold and chilling of the body.4 We know that thyroid hormone releases bound natural tissue antigen from sources otherwise not physiologically active,5 permitting the ever-circulating antibody to reach the antigen and thereby create histamine.
If the antibody is not present in high enough amounts at the time of the exposure to cold to promote the reaction, then the dumping into the blood of the antigen will ensure the formation of antibody in a few days, so that there is both an immediate reaction and a delayed reaction to take into account. The immediate reaction is, in sensitive persons, so definite that chilling a part of the body will cause local trouble. Who has not experienced the local stiffness and arthritic pains from chilling the back or lumbar areas? Andrewes and associates in England report test results that show colds to be a viral infection, causing definite reactions in victims whose resistance is temporarily diminished, definitely contagious, and often aborted after initial symptoms appear.6
The effect of body chilling in causing colds has been attributed to the local aggravation of histamine release by such influence,7 but we feel that the thyroid is also to be considered as contributory, especially where a systemic reaction with fever occurs subsequent to the exposure. The various cold epidemics that occur are definitely different at times. We have noted, for instance, selective activity causing all victims to lose their voice in one epidemic, while they were all left with a persistent cough in another. The cold virus was found to have a smaller filterable molecular size than the influenza virus. (Evidently there are as many varieties of cold and influenza viruses as there are of mosquitoes or house flies.)
But the important finding by Andrewes was the confirmation of the fact that the cold could be aborted in some cases, where the victim had enough natural resistance to throw off the invading virus. We need to know how to reinforce that defensive activity at will.
The favorable biochemical state seems to depend on two circumstances: 1) the proper buffer balance of the body fluids, to avoid the sensitization of the chain reaction of allergic response to liberated histamine, and 2) a healthy liver function, affording a sufficient supply of the detoxifying and antihistamine liver hormone known as yakriton (Anti-Pyrexin [now Antronex] to us)—so well investigated in Japan but disregarded here.8 Anti-Pyrexin is now available with added buffers of carbamide and sodium phosphate (Anti-Pyrexin Buffered).
Of course, the possible need for other synergistic vitamins must not be forgotten. The vitamin C complex is antihistaminic,9 and natural C complex has a great reputation as a cold remedy. Vitamin B12 is another antihistaminic.10 But our present opinion is that Anti-Pyrexin (Buffered) will prove the most widely accepted of all the physiological weapons once its favorable action is known.
*In Mercutio’s speech about Queen Mab in Romeo and Juliet:
O’er ladies’ lips who straight on
kisses dream,
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters
plague,
Because their breaths with sweetmeats
tainted are.
References
- Virus as Organism, Harvard University Press, 1945.
- Lee and Hanson. Protomorphology, p. 167. Lee Foundation, 1947.
- Science, 92:313, 1940.
- Mansfeld, G. fur Exper. Pathologie, 196:607, 1940.
- Eickhoff, et al. Z. Immunitate, 93:368, 1938.
- Lancet, 2:657–660, 1952.
- Yearbook of Medicine, p. 18, 1950.
- Jol. Exper. Med., 24:515–520.
- Zimmerman, B. West J. Surg., 52:352, 1944.
- Leitch, G.B. Northwest Med., 52:291, 1953; J Allergy, 22:183–185, 1951.
Tip of the Month (Celery Root)
Celery root (celeriac) supplies glutamine, which, according to a note in Cosmopolitan (November 1955), stops the craving for alcohol. (Celeriac is used to impart a flavor to soups and is sometimes cooked in vinegar as a vegetable.) Glutamine, which is too unstable to be available as a concentrate, acts as a physiological buffer to maintain a close regulation of blood pH. It is good for allergic tendencies and neuritis because such patients are usually over alkaline. Alkalinity is easily corrected by Cal-Amo Tablets. (See Applied Trophology, Vol. 1, No. 2.)
Defeatism Hampers Multiple Sclerosis Fight
The treatment of multiple sclerosis is being hampered by a defeatist attitude about the disease in the medical profession, Dr. Douglas McAlpine of the Institute of Clinical Research, Middlesex Hospital, reported in the British Medical Journal (March 2).
“Above all, the impression must not be left on the patient’s mind that he or she is suffering from a mysterious disease about which nothing is known and for which there is no treatment,” he reported.
Support for the so-called allergic theory of this disease, which progressively destroys the protective covering of the nerves, has been increasing in recent years. Many victims of the disease show some form of allergy, fatigue, previous infections, trauma, and emotional stress, he reported.
None of these are conclusive proof that the disease is an allergic type of illness, but they are all “compatible” with that theory, Dr. McAlpine said.
One of the difficulties in treatment lies in not diagnosing the illness until four or five years after its first appearance. This could be overcome by making the public more aware of the early symptoms, but until the medical profession adopts less of a defeatist attitude about treatment, it would probably not be justified, the physician reported.
This present attitude comes from the lack of a realistic approach to the problem. The fact that no known drug can alter the course of the disease is not a valid enough reason for neglecting general treatment principles, he reported.
Treatment of an early case of multiple sclerosis should be centered around the patient’s constitutional and environmental background rather than on the nervous system, Dr. McAlpine believes. It should be undertaken with the same attitude as that taken towards tuberculosis.
“If this were done, I feel convinced that in a worthwhile proportion of cases, the disastrous results which we see all too often would be avoided or at least mitigated,” he concluded.
—Science News Letter, March 16, 1957.
[Note from editor of Applied Trophology]: The most important consideration in multiple sclerosis is to use Dr. Coca’s “Pulse Test” to eliminate the allergenic food that is causing it. The book The Pulse Test by A.F. Coca, MD, is available on ten-day approval through Vitamin Products Company, Milwaukee 1, Wisconsin—$4.95.Auto Accidents Causing Whip Injury to Neck
Whiplash injuries to the human neck are now common occurrences on the highway because of the large percentage of traffic accidents that involve standing cars, a regional meeting of the International College of Surgeons was told in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia.
Such an injury, caused by a snapping back of the head, may be of such little effect at the time that the individual gives it no attention, but symptoms can show up at a much later date, Vice Admiral Ross T. McIntire, Chicago, executive director of the college and former White House physician to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, pointed out.
The unprotected back of the neck is easily damaged when an automobile is rammed from behind, and the injury may involve any of the nerves there, he said.
“Very often symptoms do not arise, in cases where there have been no fractures, for a period of many years,” he reported.
Some of the symptoms of whiplash injury that Dr. McIntire listed are: often some degree of concussion; a neuralgic type of pain over a large part of the neck, back of the head, and lower portion of the face; and a headache that begins at the back of the head and may radiate to the center of the skull and, finally, center behind one or both eyes.
If the force of the blow is at an angle, the neck may be severely rotated and cause other symptoms, he said. These include muscular spasms, dizziness, nausea, and inability to see properly.
Eye troubles are persistent when whiplash injuries show up months or years after the accident, Dr. McIntire added. Early diagnosis and treatment are important.
—Science News Letter, March 23, 1957.
What Is the Professional Attitude?
“A professional attitude must be learned. It is not a natural gift. It is natural to be selfish—to place personal gain ahead of service. That is precisely why the people as a whole honor the relatively few—like professional men and other true public servants who have disciplined themselves to follow the nobler course. The rules of ethics are guides to right action, to action that will develop the professional attitude and thus deserve public confidence.”
—John L. Carey, Professional Ethics of Certified Public Accountants, New York, H. Wolff, 1956.
High Points of Standard Process Nutritional Adjuncts
Potassium Bicarbonate: Useful to release adrenal function, in combating colds, etc. The adrenal is inhibited by potassium deficiency. Potter’s Materia Medica states, “Potassium bicarbonate is the first remedy to think of in influenza.” Vitamins fail to help if potassium is lacking. Natural vitamin C complex is an important supporter of adrenal function and should follow potassium bicarbonate in all acute “colds.”
Pneumotrophin [PMG]: This is a lung extract (beef lung) containing lung protomorphogen that was developed with the thought of rebuilding lung tissue, just as Bio-Dent (made with a cold-processed veal bone flour that contains bone protomorphogen) will rebuild the bone structure where atrophy has taken place. In addition to this function, Pneumotrophin has indicated its ability to clear up bronchieclasis and other bronchial congestions, such as bronchial cough, that linger after a cold or the flu. When this product was being developed, it was found to be helpful in certain asthmatic conditions. It has been found to be of some help in sinus conditions, also for “cigarette cough.” In fact, for mucous membrane irritations of the respiratory tract in general.
