Your Health, Whose Responsibility Is It Anyhow?
Humans were not placed (nor did they evolve) into an inherently hostile environment. Bacteria, viruses, molds, fungi, are all part of the natural order of things. Germs are not “out to get us”. We do not "catch" diseases. To become ill from these organisms, you need to offer them a friendly place to grow. It is much the same as planting a garden or sowing a field. Seeds of plants will not grow just anywhere. You have to offer them a friendly environment: soil, water, warmth, sunlight, etc. in order to have a good crop. Bacteria and viruses also need to find proper conditions inside our bodies in order to grow and thrive. If you maintain a proper level of immune health, they will not find your environment a fit place to live.
If I come down with a cold, I feel that my immune system is sending me a message. Usually, with me, a cold follows a period in which I have been ignoring or flaunting my common sense. A stretch of too many late nights, too much rich food, laxity with my exercise routine, and so on often culminates in the familiar cold symptoms. Chastened, I take the hint and resolve to try harder the next time to be more attentive to my needs. I don’t blame the last person I saw who also had a cold, or the weather, or that I got a chill, or that some virus was conspiring to ‘get’ me. These are cop-outs fed to us by a failing medical paradigm.
According to a report given at the Annual Meeting of the Infectious Disease Society that I recently read in Dr. Mercola’s website, 46% of people erroneously think that they catch a cold by not wearing enough clothes. While 57% of people mistakenly believe that being out in cold weather causes colds and 37% feel that if they left their homes with wet hair they would succumb to a cold. The author of this report mocks these beliefs, yet feels perfectly justified in saying that the true cause of a cold spreading to an otherwise healthy individual is through a handshake with an infected one. This is ludicrous. It is true that these physical stresses and contacting a virus does assault our immune systems; however, none of these events in themselves cause anything. Unless your immune system is weak or compromised, you will stay healthy. The blame for falling ill lies squarely with you.
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