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New Research Indicates Alzheimer's and Other Neurodegenerative Diseases Are Contagious

A.B.

Senior Member
Messages
3,780
In a recent article published in Gut Pathogens, HMI researchers George and Victor Tetz said they have linked the diseases to bacteriophages.

"This is a revolutionary discovery that completely changes views on the causes of incurable diseases like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, dementia and other," said George Tetz, head of research and development at HMI. "To our knowledge, this is the first study to indicate that bacteriophages can cause human diseases. Infection from bacteriophages that are known solely to target bacteria may be harmful to mammals and humans, opening new ways to prevent and cure these diseases."

Their research links the bacterial viruses to what they have named "microbiota diseases." Microbiota diseases caused by bacterial viruses lead to so-called "leaky gut" syndrome, which has in recent years been found to enable the translocation of bacteria that triggers chronic inflammation associated with inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease, cancer, Alzheimer's, autism, diabetes, heart conditions, rheumatoid arthritis and more.

"Our findings indicate that bacteriophages, which were previously not considered mammalian or human pathogens, can promote microbiota diseases and, thus, indirectly cause pathological conditions of mammals that are associated with leaky gut," the researchers wrote.

ME/CFS is another illness with leaky gut and dysbiosis.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...rative-diseases-are-contagious-300333155.html
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
Its about time someone is looking at this. I was asking about this decades ago, and everybody said "no". I was interested because nobody was looking. This is a press release though, so we cannot be sure of the information. Its also likely that bacteriophages are indeed infectious, but what that actually means is highly speculative at this point.

One of the questions I asked long ago, of DeMeirlier if my memory is accurate, is could bacteriophages infect mitochondria. He said he had looked (presumably under an electron microscope) and not found any signs of this. This hypothesis is unlikely, but I have not fully ruled it out.
 

Marky90

Science breeds knowledge, opinion breeds ignorance
Messages
1,253
What part of their research indicated that? Had a look but could not find..
 

Glycon

World's Most Dangerous Hand Puppet
Messages
299
Location
ON, Canada
It's a press release that exaggerates a lot. But it's an interesting hypothesis and it's good that bacteriophages are being looked at.

This kind of language makes it sound super-flaky, though:
The study is already receiving feedback from profound scholars...
Nikolai Petrovsky, professor of medicine at Flinders University who authored over 90 scholarly papers and chapters.
 

Jonathan Edwards

"Gibberish"
Messages
5,256
What part of their research indicated that? Had a look but could not find..

Aha, they found that if you give rats the Russian jungle juice 'bacteriophage cocktail'(shaken not stirred) they show typical signs of Alzheimer's like weight loss, messy hair, and decreased activity!!!

If I were a lab rat and I was injected with a Russian cocktail I think I would probably be off my food and forget to do my hair and lie about. But clearly this proves that bacteriophages cause rheumatoid arthritis and Parkinson's disease.

Give me a break. Bacteriophages in the gut are this week's trendy topic. Biomedcentral journals are places for publishing trendy topics so that the publishers can rake in a few quid. They are designed specifically for profound scholars with more than 90 papers so it must be good, even if they are mostly read by desperate post docs who need to get ten publications to have a chance of another job.

It is such a pity that science has been replaced by tat. But at least I don't have to battle with it any more.
 

Marky90

Science breeds knowledge, opinion breeds ignorance
Messages
1,253
Hahaha yes.. who would imagine,@Jonathan Edwards :rolleyes:

It seems to be a recurring theme that something is tried on rats-> subsequently they perform less good on some type of mundane task -> the researchers propose something like the above -> journalists write sensational headlines -> then the years pass, and nothing come of it, except the ones involved are payed - and do it again.
 

IreneF

Senior Member
Messages
1,552
Location
San Francisco
Why are phages so exciting these days? The role of bacteriophage T12 in scarlet fever exotoxin has been known for decades, for example.
 

barbc56

Senior Member
Messages
3,657
OMG, not messy hair syndrome! I need to take to my bed. Oh wait, that's where I am now. Today is one of those days where I will probably be staying in bed most of the time, messy hair or not!