Catch Cold

CATCH A COLD
Gabe Mirkin, M.D.
Do you believe that you will catch a cold when you go out in the cold without warm clothing or when you have wet hair? If you say no, you are correct.
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Coldsand pneumonia are caused by infection. You do not pick up infections from cold weather, you get germs from other people who sneeze or cough in your face or transmit germs with their hands to objectsthat you touch. Research shows that the most common way to get a cold is from someone who has a cold, sneezes on his hands, and then shakes yours. You can also get a cold when a person blows his nose orcoughs into a handkerchief and gets some of the germs on his hands, then touches a door knob, and hours later, you touch the door knob and put your fingers in your nose. So the only way that you canget a cold is for someone to give the germ to you directly or by putting the germ onto something else that you touch.
The real question about colds is whether chilling the body hinders your immunityso that you can't kill the germs in your body, so the germs that you can normally control suddenly become pathogens and make you sick, because your immunity is suppressed by you being cold. Thatquestion has been answered many times. Chilling does not hinder your immunity as long as you aren't so cold that your body defenses are destroyed. In 1958, H.F. Dowling, and his friends wrote a paper inthe American Journal of Hygiene, (Vol. 68, pp. 659-65) : "Transmission of the Common Cold to Volunteers Under Controlled Conditions". More than 400 volunteers were exposed to viruses that cause colds.Some were exposed to very cold temperatures while wearing heavy coats, some to 60 degree temperatures while wearing underwear, and some to a very warm 80 degrees. All had the same rate of infection.This shows that the crucial factor that determine whether you get a cold is being exposed to the virus that causes the cold.
Then in 1968, R.G. Douglas, Jr., wrote a paper entitled, "Exposure to...