COVID risks and risks of COVID might sum up today’s post, highlighting the possible two-way street between this coronavirus pandemic and autoimmunity diseases. Two questions have arisen from the COVID 19 pandemic. First, who is at risk? Second, after the infection is over what problems are left behind? Autoimmunity, or the condition where our bodies attack themselves finds itself in the hot seat for both of these critical questions.
European researchers are apparently not afraid to do real research. In this case they looked at 86,306 children from The Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study from 1999 to 2009 and correlated increased gluten intake at age 18 months with a 46% increased risk of type 1 diabetes. A prior study had suggested that mom’s intake during pregnancy was a major factor,
The number of correlations linking methylation cycle SNPS (single
nucleotide polymorphisms) to various disease is growing. In this case, researching in Italy found
three gene SNPS in higher frequencies for patients with vitiligo. This autoimmune attack on one’s skin melanin
cells leaves behind an absence of pigment in coalescing patches. Stopping its progression across the patient’s
body and reversing the past depigmentation stands as a challenge to
conventional medicine and functional medicine.
In functional medicine, we see a myriad of patients who have been dismissed by conventional medicine as psychosomatic, meaning “its just in their head”. Many children, teens, and occasionally young adults enter our clinic with the oddest of mental and emotional symptoms. The common factor lies in the symptoms having begun suddenly soon after some type of infection.