How Covid Makes Cells Commit Suicide
I’m not minimizing the suffering this damned virus has caused, but once again I am amazed at the complexity and wonder of our life processes. These things our cells produce called cytokines protect us from inflammation and attack by foreign invaders. Yay cytokines.
But Covid, for some reason and in some folks, causes a “cytokine storm” which is a killer. A virus is tiny and not exactly alive. It can’t move on its own or reproduce. It invades a host cell and fools it into producing not more cells, but more viruses. When a cell recognizes this nefarious activity, cytokines tell the cell to kill itself and the invader dies too. Brave cytokines.
A cytokine storm happens when the response is extreme. Lots of cells commit suicide and in the case of Covid, lots of these cells are in the capillaries of the lungs. Hence deaths from pneumonia and the need for ventilators. Researchers are developing antibody therapy around the world and some are at the human test stage, filtering out antibodies from patients who recovered. Using nature against nature.
This is nothing strange. Penicillin, which has saved millions, uses nature against nature. A certain mold kills bacteria; yay certain mold. We seem to think that scientists make up some chemicals in a flask and save us, but the truth is, penicillin et al are produced by Mother Nature and we would do well to work with Nature instead of trying to conquer it.
For all researchers with imagination and open minds: May your tribe increase.
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