Donna’s Blog

Some people believe that the sole cause of rising rates of immune-mediated disorders is due to what is called “the hygiene hypothesis.”  The hygiene hypothesis holds that the root cause of rising rates of immune related diseases stems not from the fact that we are living in too dirty a world, but, rather, from the fact that we are living too clean.  In other words, our lack of exposure to certain viruses and the swill of bacteria that most of our ancestors were exposed to living without vaccines or modern hygiene means children’s immune systems are no longer forced to build up the necessary immune defenses they need.  In a world of well-vacuumed homes, scrubbed bathrooms and more time spent in minivans than mucking about through the woods and farmland, coupled with massive vaccination programs that prevent full-fledged infection from many childhood diseases, our immune systems are, in a sense, overprotected.  They have so little to react to that they may be overreacting to anything – kind of like a bored teenager who is likely to get in more trouble when they don’t have enough to do.

However, immunotoxicologists at our research institutions agree almost universally that the hygiene hypothesis is hardly enough to fully explain today’s autoimmune epidemic.  At the same time that we are living with fewer exposures to natural pathogens, we are coming into contact with many times more artificial invaders in our day-to-day lives.  So that at the same time our immune systems may be confronting less natural dirt and muck and deadly outbreaks of disease, we’re encountering an endless slew of artificial toxins that confuse and overtax the immune system.  Interestingly, immigrants from other countries who are exposed to numerous infections and have few vaccines as young children develop allergies and autoimmune disease at rates similar to those of Americans soon after they immigrate to this country.