'Selfish' genes tell us to stay home
when sick
There are some "selfish"
genes which tell you to stay in bed whenever you feel sick, your nose is
stuffed and your headache is spreading to your toes -- only to save others from
infections, say researchers.
Along with the symptoms, the sick
individual can become depressed and lose interest in social and sexual contact,
limiting opportunities to transmit pathogens, they noted.
According to them, feeling sick is an
evolutionary adaptation and evolution is functioning on the level of the
"selfish gene". Even though the individual organism may not survive
the illness, isolating itself from its social environment will reduce the
overall rate of infection in the group.
"From the point of view of the
individual, this behaviour may seem overly altruistic. But from the perspective
of the gene, its odds of being passed down are improved," said lead
researcher Keren Shakhar from Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel.
The scientists went through a list of
common symptoms, and each seems to support their hypothesis. Appetite loss, for
example, hinders the disease from spreading by communal food or water
resources.
Fatigue and weakness can lessen the
mobility of the infected individual, reducing the radius of possible infection.
"We know that isolation is the
most efficient way to stop a transmissible disease from spreading," added
Guy Shakhar from Weizmann Institute's Immunology Department in Israel.
"The problem is that today, for
example, with flu, many do not realize how deadly it can be. So they go against
their natural instincts, take a pill to reduce pain and fever and go to work,
where the chance of infecting others is much higher," Shakhar concluded.
The study was published recently in the journal of PLoS
Biology.
Source: www.zeenews.india.com
09.01.2016
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