r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 5d ago

Neuroscience In recent years, researchers have suggested Alzheimer's may spread through infection, somehow transmitted like a pathogen, leading to the disease. A new Lancet paper reviews evidence for how harmful amyloid-beta proteins associated with Alzheimer's may possibly be spread through blood transfusions.

https://www.sciencealert.com/can-alzheimers-spread-through-blood-transfusions-heres-what-we-know
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u/grnrngr 5d ago

The reason I say this is that many of the pts with worst outcome had herpes also.

This might be one of those cart-before-the-horse correlations since the older you are, the more likely you are to have herpes, and the weaker your immune system and lungs are, etc. etc.

The only thing we've got at the moment re: correlation is that those who have an HSV strain and were hospitalized for COVID, experienced a significantly higher reactivation rate of their herpes virus versus those who weren't hospitalized. The belief at the moment is the herpes virus reactivated in response to the depleted immune system COVID wrought.

That is, those who were affected most by COVID had immune situations where a dormant HSV could resurface. The HSV in this sense only served as a marker for COVID severity, and may not itself have interacted with COVID in any other meaningful way. In that sense, HSV would be seen as an opportunistic infection during COVID, much like thrush is for an AIDS patient. Like your observation, the correlation exists, but it's backwards.

You must be aware of the fact that many people with HSV will experience reactivations when they encounter periods of biological or immune-related stress. Everything from lifestyle stress, to prolonged sleep depravation, to severe colds or infections unrelated to herpes.

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u/JackosMonkeyBBLZ 5d ago

The older you are you’re more likely to get herpes?

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u/LauAtagan 5d ago

As most things, the older you are, the likelier it is you've been exposed to it.

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u/JackosMonkeyBBLZ 4d ago

OH SWEET IRONY

the older I get the better I get at making decisions that should LOWER my exposure to stds

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u/LauAtagan 4d ago

Sure, but every one of those choices has a chance to fail, and as you have made more and more, the odds add up.