Reply #23: Some truth, some danger, in what you say

[jobycom]

A close friend of mine had asthma as a kid. He certainly wasn't bubble-ized, so he had his fair exposure to contaminants. When he was in his teens he went to specialist who cured him by finding whatever he was allergic to and building up his immunity by--as you say--gradually increasing his exposure to it to build up his immunity. This is also, obviously, the way immunizations work. So yes, we can harm our kids, and adults, but protecting them too much from contaminants--and just about every other factor.

On the other hand, there is no question that certain thinks cause illness or breakdowns in our bodies, and that no amount of conditioning will fix them. Many substances are toxic, carcingenic, etc. We have higher levels of contaminants in our air and soil and water and food than at any point in history. We also consume things that were never consumed until modern times, like white flour and high fructose corn syrup. We also consume things in quantities never before consumed--sugar, beef, meat in general. These major changes in diet and living conditions have to affect the body somehow, both positively and negatively. There can be no doubt that the average life expectancy of humans has increased, and that we are aging better. Forty is no longer the beginning of old age, sixty is no longer the threshold of decrepitude, seventy is no longer a rare age to reach. Obviously we are doing a lot right.

But heart disease, diabetes, asthma and cancer have also increased, even in younger age groups (so it's not just the result of living longer to catch more diseases we would have avoided by dying young). There's nothing wrong with investigating how these changes affect the human body. Obviously, not every kid who eats a hamburger has asthma. But if your child has asthma, it might be good to know if eating hamburgers (actually the study seems to have been more about fast food in general than just about hamburgers) has been shown to be a factor.

Obviously this study is too isolated to be taken as conclusive. But it isn't bad to understand the world we live in. Don't put your kid in a bubble, but don't feed him a diet of lead paint chips and Marlboros, either. Somewhere between the two seems wisest.