When Cleanliness Is Next to Malignancy
Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infects about 80 percent of the population. So if CMV causes glioblastoma multiforme, as Charles Cobbs of San Francisco’s California Pacific Medical Center Research Institute hypothesizes, why do only a small number of people develop brain tumors? Cobbs argues that the same question could be asked for known cancer-causing pathogens such as human papillomavirus: “That’s actually the dogma—that you have widespread infection and in only a small percentage of cases there is cancer.” In glioblastoma, he has noticed that the majority of patients are affluent, and he speculates that people infected with latent CMV might be more likely to get tumors if they grow up in hygienic environments.
The idea stems from the “hygiene hypothesis,” used to explain the rising incidence of allergies in developed countries. It posits that childhood exposure to pathogens primes the immune system to respond appropriately; however, when people grow up in “superclean” environments, their immune system does not mature properly. When infected with CMV, these patients might then be at a heightened risk for developing glioblastoma, Cobbs says—but he admits his idea is based on little more than a hunch.
Note: This article was originally printed with the title, "Virus in the Brain".
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4 Comments
Add CommentWhat a startling piece of valuable research. My late father's brain tumour was difficult to manage. I published a book about it - it was a difficult memoir to write. We had little information. How wonderful that such a disease may be preventable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a clinical virologist I am very disappointed in your choice of title for this article. Clearly your choice of "Herpes" as the cause of Sen. Edward Kennedy's brain cancer was meant to grab attention when in reality the cytomegalovirus (CMV) is the true putative cause of these tumors. Shame on you for going for the misleading and attention grabing headline rather than the facts. The previous commenter is a perfect example of the misinformation this type of journalism perpetuates.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI could not find a way to contact the author, so decided to ask my question here. I wander if someone can answer the question here or/and in another article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis article describes a problem - 1. why do only a small number of people (with virus) develop brain tumors? 2. Why virus actively reproducing in these tumor cellsand not in healthy cells nearby?
It looks like the answer is (almost) given in this article http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=experts-gene-therapy i.e. virus may insert its DNA to a random place in human DNA. Sometimes that may change DNA code in a way causing cancer (answer to question 1). All tumor cells are descendants of this one unlucky cell and so they all have virus DNA in them (answer to question 2). If that is true (that I do not believe, because that is too simple to be true) other types of cancer may be caused by a virus too. If that is true, DNA of any tumor cell may be sequenced and compared to DNA of other cells of the same person to find out DNA sequence of that virus. The immune system of the person may then be taught to attack tumor cells in a way described in yet another ScientificAmerican article.
Of course real science is not done by people reading ScientificAmerican. I am just asking a question if the two articles describe facts correctly, why the above is not correct?
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