Infected with Insanity: Could Microbes Cause Mental Illness? ~ Scientific American Mind

[mzmolly]

Key Concepts ~ Bugs and the Brain

* Mental illnesses once thought to be the result of neurological or psychological defects may be caused by viral or microbial infections.

* The strongest evidence links schizophrenia to prenatal influenza infection; pregnant women who become ill with the flu are more likely to give birth to children who will develop schizophrenia.

* The body’s immune reaction, rather than the infections themselves, may be to blame for the resulting brain damage and psychiatric symptoms.

* Understanding the relation between infections and psychiatric disorders may someday allow us to prevent mental illness using drugs or vaccines.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=infected-with-insanity">SCIENTIFICAMERICAN.COM

"In 1896 Scientific American published an editorial entitled “Is Insanity Due to a Microbe?” The question seemed logical, given that microbes were starting to be implicated in other diseases. In the editorial, two doctors described how they had injected cerebrospinal fluid of mentally ill patients into rabbits, which later got sick. The doctors concluded that “certain forms of insanity” could be caused by infectious agents, “similar to typhoid, diphtheria and others.” But when Freudian psychoanalysis became popular in the 1930s, the idea was more or less put to rest. Then, in the 1950s, the discovery of DNA as hereditary material sparked a rising interest in genetics as a cause of illness, including mental disorders. Several papers reported a clear hereditary component to diseases such as schizophrenia, but genes were obviously not the whole story—as a number of studies have found, the identical twin of someone with schizophrenia has only about a one-in-two chance of developing schizophrenia himself. Certain environmental influences therefore probably interact with genes to trigger mental illness in a person with a genetic predisposition. Scientists began investigating everything from diet and lifestyle to parental nurturing and geographical location. In 1973 E. Fuller Torrey, now a research psychiatrist at the Stanley Medical Research Institute in Chevy Chase, Md., published an article in the British journal Lancet that revived an idea that had been set aside for decades—could microbial infection cause mental illness?"

See Infected With Insanity on page 40 here ----> https://myportal.bsd405.org/personal/suttonp/seniorenglish/Unit%203%20%20The%20Bluest%20Eye/Buried%20Prejudice.pdf">SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN MIND APRIL/MAY 2008 for more information on this fascinating subject.

*cross posted in the Health Forum*

[Posteritatis]

1. I find the "let's talk about mental illness monolithically" tone there a bit offputting.. (nt)

[mzmolly]

2. Who is suggesting

a singular cause?

[Posteritatis]

3. You rarely see "can such-and-such cause physical illness?"

But talking about mental illness as One Thing as opposed to hundreds or thousands of specific disorders is all too common, like the whole idea of a genetic predisposition to mental illness.

SciAm should know better, though that kind of headline probably sells more.

[mzmolly]

4. You don't rarely see can such and such cause physical illness.

"Can flu cause nausea?" YES, is the definitive answer.

[JuniperLea]

5. Indeed!

This is important stuff... yet here we see the piano player being shot... again.

Thanks for posting this... as someone with a family member diagnosed as schizophrenic, I'm always happy to see the multiple layering of research continue. We have NO family history... this issue has been openly discussed with much interest for three generations now. Allergies, physical injury to the brain, now possible virus...

Anyone who says we know everything is the biggest idiot on Earth, seriously.

[Posteritatis]

8. That's a specific symptom

"Mental illness" is not, any more than "physical illness" is.

[mzmolly]

11. You can break down specific symptoms

of mental illness if you desire. The article has specifics if you care to read it.

[piedmont]

22. A more accurate analogy would be "Do Orthomyxoviridae viruses cause flu?" or...

"Does HIV cause AIDS?"

But yeah, flu and AIDS are more specific identifiers of physical illnesses than "mental illness."

[mzmolly]

24. If the article only dealt with one microbe and a single mental illness,

perhaps.

[On the Road]

9. You See It All the Time for Specific Illnesses:

Does caffeine cause strokes?
Does nicotine cause cancer?

[bain_sidhe]

10. Not equivalent

The equivalents would be:

Does caffeine call physical illness?
Does nicotine cause physical illness?

Well, yeah, they do, but it's never put that way, it's always about a specific illness, such as your examples. What the poster was saying was that a better headline would have been, "Can microbes cause schizophrenia?" - because schizophrenia is a particular, specific illness that has been suggested may be caused by "microbes."

[mzmolly]

13. The article covers various microbes and various mental illness.

eom

[mike_c]

6. why not?

I mean, it's a matter of intent. We can speak of "pathogens" as a group because all pathogens share at least some characteristics, even though their diversity is also immense. Same with "disease," "injury," and "birth defect." Recognizing their shared commonalities is not the same as denying their individual causes, symptoms, treatments, and the diverse experiences of the folks who suffer them. I don't have any trouble thinking of "mental illness" in the same sense-- there might be lots of individual ways to experience mental illness, but certainly they all share some common characteristics that allow the collective term "mental illness" to have meaning.

[mzmolly]

27. Good

points all around. :hi:

[ananda]

7. Fantastic article!

What's interesting is that there has been evidence for
this possibility since 1896!

[mzmolly]

14. Yes

it is. Seems we may have backtracked a bit? :hi:

[deaniac21]

12. Microbes and magnetic fields.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

15. Chemtrails

Evil ass educators suppress Time Cube.

[mzmolly]

20. "two doctors described how they had injected cerebrospinal fluid of mentally ill patients into

rabbits, which later got sick." I wonder if such studies exist regarding chemtrails? :eyes:

"And yet studies have repeatedly linked schizophrenia to prenatal infections with influenza virus and other microbes, showing that the children of mothers who suffer these infections during pregnancy are more likely to be diagnosed with schizophrenia later in life. In 2006 scientists at Columbia University asserted that up to one fifth of all schizophrenia cases are caused by prenatal infections."

Those 'crazy' scientists! No pun intended. ;)

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

21. Did you notice the post that I was replying to?

As opposed to the different topic in your OP which I was not replying to?

[mzmolly]

23. Ah.

I wasn't sure who was "series" and who was not. My apologies. :hi:

[Quantess]

31. That cracked me up for some weird reason.

:spray:

[Therellas]

16. that was funny.

microbes eh?
my bugs can beat those bugs up.

[mzmolly]

18. Are you disputing the information in the SAM

article? I'm guessing you've not read it, if so.

[RainDog]

17. interesting. thanks for the post n/t

[mzmolly]

19. You're welcome.

:hi:

[Barack_America]

25. Maybe. When I was in medical school I learned of this bizarre finding....

....regarding anatomic differences of the size sinuses between schizophrenics and "normal" people.

Maybe being more prone to infection might explain this correlation?

Interesting.

[mzmolly]

26. Could be.

I've heard similar issues surround children who have been diagnosed with PANDAS. Many of the family members also have a high incidence of auto-immune issues. http://www.pandasnetwork.org/fhtable.html

[Barack_America]

28. They say that, "Inflammation is the root of all disease".

I am a firm believer of this.

In a week I'll actually begin an Allergy and Immunology elective to learn more about this idea.

[mzmolly]

29. I wouldn't doubt that at all. I recently read here that over the counter

pain meds can help with depression etc. Some Dr.s are using what's known as a steroid burst (5 days on Prednisone) to diagnose PANDAS. If a child responds positively to Prednisone or? then he/she is thought to have PANDAS and treatment proceeds accordingly.

Keep us posted on what you learn. :hi:

[Barack_America]

30. The big news this week was the efficacy of aspirin in reducing breast cancer deaths.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elaine-schattner/big-news-on-aspirin-for-b_b_468698.html

Cool stuff.

[mzmolly]

32. Very cool

indeed. :hi:

[XemaSab]

33. Very interesting

The mind is truly a black box.

[sohndrsmith]

34. Lyme disease, anyone?

Shouldn't the question be: Why is this something we question?

Lead and mercury cause horrifically destructive mental/behavioral/developmental harm. Syphilis leads to mental disease. Being bitten by an infected tick can lead to life-altering psychological problems. Experiencing trauma can cause severe emotional debilitation.

I wonder why we differentiate between these manifestations and others, such as tumors and scars? The sad answer is that, for some reason, we assign one with a value judgment on some level, often based on some ugly morality-based (nee: religiously-based) measure or standard. That is a question I wish we had the courage to address adequately, because not doing so causes so much additional pain.

Why we still have the medieval concept that the "mind" is somehow separate from our bodies is what freaks me out. The thing we call a brain? It's sort of related to all things mental, behavioral, etc. and it can be injured, poisoned, infected, diseased, scrambled... and, as shocking as this may sound: it's a part of our bodies. Physically. No fooling. Not only that, but as I can tell it's not exactly magical or mysterious like unicorns and wizard spells. So why do we separate it as such and designate judgment on it's owner when it doesn't work somehow?

Can microbes/viruses/bacteria/toxins/substances cause mental illness? If toxins, even physical injury can cause mental difficulties, why are we so afraid to consider other causes or find them to be such a stretch? Why do we seem determined to keep mental, behavioral, emotional symptoms and suffering so unrelated to the rest of our bodies and it's functions (or malfunctions).

I'm not an expert, but I'll give you a definitive 2-part answer (opinion) anyway:
1. Why not?
2. Yep.
: )

[mzmolly]

35. EXCELLENT point!

You summed it up perfectly right here >>> "Why we still have the medieval concept that the "mind" is somehow separate from our bodies is what freaks me out."

[sohndrsmith]

37. Well, I probably could have used a better phrase than "freaks me out" ...

But thank you. : )

[freeplessinseattle]

36. or, hey, there's always syphyllis

if you're into endless speculation.

[smalll]

38. Yep, and germs are making us fat.

Also, there's a rampant asshole-virus sweeping the nation as well!

Don't Blame Us! We're crazy obese jerks because of our ENVIRONMENT!!!!!!11!!!1!!1!

:shrug:

( :think: Who can we sue?)