
Why can’t we cure the common cold? - elorant
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/oct/06/why-cant-we-cure-the-common-cold?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits
======
sleavey
So a promising treatment for the cold was dropped by the drug company because
it was too expensive to develop, and the potential payoff too small. Drug
companies' profit models pretty much require them to focus on developing drugs
that people have to use for the rest of their lives - that manage a condition
rather than treat it.

Is there a good reason why we shouldn't club together as rich countries and
fund a not-for-profit drug research body that _does_ fund this sort of thing?

~~~
mft_
_> Drug companies' profit models pretty much require them to focus on
developing drugs that people have to use for the rest of their lives - that
manage a condition rather than treat it._

Not true - there are plenty of examples of genuine cures developed and
marketed by pharma.

What drug companies _do_ require is a return on their investment, which can be
in the multiple-billions. This isn't evil-big-pharma stuff... this is just how
any sensibly-run company operates, pharma or otherwise.

Achieving an ROI is seen as difficult _in this particular case_ because (as
TFA says) people don't value vaccines highly enough because they are taken
when they're well, and (as you say) they're only needed once.

(Personally, I think the article over-estimates this challenge; sell 100m
doses at $50/dose and [assuming CoG is not a problem] you've got a major
blockbuster. Even if the NHS/insurers didn't want to pay, employers and
individuals likely would, at this price level. And 100m doses is pretty low-
ball, if you consider the likely uptake of a vaccine promising a genuine cure
for the commonest cause of the common cold.)

-

 _> Is there a good reason why we shouldn't club together as rich countries
and fund a not-for-profit drug research body that does fund this sort of
thing?_

I've wondered about this in the past. I think a major aspect is risk.

If it was easy to pick a disease to cure and a way to do it, then we'd not be
in this situation in the first place - developing drugs is actually incredibly
difficult and unpredictable. This is well-demonstrated by an analysis
published in Forbes a few years ago.
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2013/08/11/the-
co...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2013/08/11/the-cost-of-
inventing-a-new-drug-98-companies-ranked/)

Rather than taking an individual drug and pricing the work done on it to bring
it to market (as with many previous studies) this analysis looks at total R&D
spend by individual pharma companies over time, and divided that spend by the
number of new drugs brought to market. As such, it takes into account the
extraordinarily high rate of attrition in drug development - the time and
money spent on countless thousands of drug candidates that are abandoned
before the ever make it to market. (Note the analysis does have one major
weakness, but now's not the time.)

To quote the article: _" For companies that have launched more than three
drugs, the median cost per new drug is $4.2 billion; for those that have
launched more than four, it is $5.3 billion."_

And there's the rub: I'm sure you could find some way of funding a few hundred
million if it was _guaranteed_ to result in a cure for a disease -
Governments, the Gates Foundation, etc. But do such bodies genuinely have the
will to spend countless billions, every year, to chase those few new
treatments that might --or might not-- emerge? And having found a new
treatment, would they just give it away... or would they want to recoup some
of the costs they'd invested?

~~~
nonbel
>"there are plenty of examples of genuine cures developed and marketed by
pharma."

Name one.

~~~
mft_
Abbvie (Mavyret) and Gilead (Solvadi, Harvoni) have both developed and
marketed treatments which cure Hepatitis C.

Roche sells MabThera which (together with chemotherapy) cures about 2/3rds of
a common type of lymphoma. They also recently failed with a large phase III
study in this setting, having hoped to cure even more people with an improved
treatment.

Celgene and Abbie/Pharmacyclics both have large phase III trials running in
the same disease, aiming to cure more patients through the addition of their
drugs to the current standard-of-care treatment.

Novartis has just launched Kymriah, a CAR-T treatment which offers the
prospect of long-term remissions in paediatric ALL. (Too early to say whether
some of these will effectively represent cures.)

Various pharmaceutical companies are attempting to develop new antibiotics,
which would cure infections.

 _(Just recent examples, and off the top of my head...)_

~~~
tialaramex
I was like "MabThera?" but then I Googled it and that's Rituximab which I'd
heard of. I had Hodgkins (which is one of the less common Lymphomas) so I got
ABVD which doesn't involve Rituximab, but I read about loads of the
chemotherapy drugs because I was morbid.

------
patall
Interesting read. Unfortunately it then comes to a sentence like this:

"For his PhD on asthma, Johnston developed a technique called polymerase chain
reaction, which magnifies DNA so that viruses can be identified more
precisely."

which make me not sure what to believe: Is that bad spelling or has the author
not even basic knowledge of modern biology?

~~~
hanniabu
I'm not well educated as I have no idea what you're referring to, mind
pointing out what in specific was misspelled or not correct.

~~~
danieltillett
The problem with the quote is Jonston neither invented the polymerase chain
reaction (PCR) nor are most cold viruses DNA viruses (most are RNA).

~~~
mrob
The reporter also called cholera a virus. You can't expect too much from
science reporting in mainstream newspapers.

~~~
danieltillett
This is certainly true. Of course if they can't report science correctly what
chance do they have on any other subject that I don't know about :)

~~~
TeMPOraL
Zero. Why people believe anything that's in mainstream news is beyond me.

------
danieltillett
The most important thing from this whole article is that the brute force
approach works. Just make a vaccine against all the different common cold
viruses (250 to 300) and vaccinate everyone. Done.

Of course this will never be done because the system for developing vaccines
is so broken that it is impossible to make money selling a vaccine for the
common cold. You could make a magic vaccine that was 100% effect with zero
side effects (no vaccine is magic) and it would be impossible to develop and
sell under the current regulations.

~~~
tempestn
You're overstating it a bit. The difficulty of making money from it does sound
like the reason we don't have such a vaccine _already_, but someday we will.
The question will be whether we're still around to enjoy it.

~~~
danieltillett
What makes you think that the regulations that prevent the development of a
vaccine today are suddenly going to go away and allow it in the future? The
reason we don't have a vaccine has nothing to do with science and everything
to do with regulations and economics.

------
Eridrus
> Sixteen healthy volunteers were kissed by people with colds. The result:
> just one confirmed infection.

This doesn't sound like a debunking of what people think at all. If the chance
of getting infected from a kissing for a minute is 6%, and you spend a week
around an infected person and you kiss them repeatedly, you will almost
certainly get sick with that infection rate.

~~~
wink
To deduct a general 6% infectionrate because 1 person got infected by 1 other
person is kind of not what I believe.

People's immune systems are so different... before I believe that I'd want to
see every sick person kissing every healthy person or something. I don't even
know how that would work with incubation times. Lock people away and just
allow contact every 2 days for 3 weeks? But then all the sick people would
probably be healthy again already.

My head explodes just trying to think about this kind of trial, mixed with
statistics :P

~~~
Eridrus
> To deduct a general 6% infectionrate because 1 person got infected by 1
> other person is kind of not what I believe.

Sure, I'm just saying this was not a very strong result in terms of disproving
the fact that kissing doesn't spread cold viruses.

------
maga
> ... experiments have shown that low temperature neither increases the
> likelihood of catching a cold, nor the severity of symptoms.

> Adults suffer an average of between two and four colds each year, and
> children up to 10, and we have come to accept this as an inevitable part of
> life.

I live in Europe and go through one or two flu seasons a year on average. I
don't recall catching cold/flu ever since I started using cold water exclusive
year-round, as I wrote previously[1]. I was pessimistic about this practice at
the beginning, and truth be told this enhanced immune system is the only
benefit I'd attribute to cold showers, yet there it is, no cold for quite a
few winters despite people around me getting it on schedule.

[1][https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8808859](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8808859)

~~~
interfixus
Mileages vary. I indulge in hot showers - and full blast heating in winters. I
haven't had a cold or any other infectious malaise since 2004. I am also in
Europe.

Mind you, I am probably more mindful about disease vectors than most. Avoid
shopping-trolleys and -baskets, keep my fingers clear of mouth, nose, and eyes
at all unwashed times.

~~~
maga
I agree, avoiding catching it is a better strategy than putting the immune
system to test every time.

I didn't do much to avoid it, though, a few times I even had to nurse close
ones through their colds fully expecting to catch it from them, yet nothing.

------
hannob
The frustrating thought I had when reading this article:

If we'd spend all the money that people spend on OTC cold remedies that almost
certainly don't work on developing a vaccine we probably could have one soon.

~~~
eric_h
OTC cold remedies do not cure your cold, but they certainly do work by
treating the symptoms. Ever taken an airplane with congested sinuses without
taking a decongestant?

~~~
TheCoelacanth
The palliatives do work, but there are a lot of things that claim to actually
shorten the duration of a cold, e.g. Zicam, Cold-EEZE that have little to no
evidence that they work.

------
eip
[http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/v05n07.shtml](http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/v05n07.shtml)

------
Feniks
Viruses laugh at man's feeble attempts to eradicate them.

They will adept. And possibly give you more than a runny nose.

------
sametmax
I've always wondered if the common cold is not something that we just need
from time to time. I mean, it seems so universal, and the reasons we catch it
so random sometime it seems like the body just decide "ok let that in".

~~~
guilhas
Agreed, like a mostly harmless disease that we get occasionally to keep our
defense mechanisms working and ready for possible worse problems. Like a
natural health check up.

------
zeristor
"Scientists today identify seven virus families that cause the majority of
colds: rhinovirus, coronavirus, influenza and parainfluenza virus, adenovirus,
respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and, finally, metapneumovirus, which was
first isolated in 2001."

------
hennsen
What the article says nothing about is the usefulness of taking Vitamin C in
high doses - it only mentions shortly regular doses probably something like
100-200mg a day. This is enough to prevent Skorbut an ensures basic need.

But there are studies that high doses can help a lot with colds.

EDIT:

examples:

[http://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/9/4/339](http://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/9/4/339)

[https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-03/uoh-
ldo03301...](https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-03/uoh-
ldo033017.php)

[https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/high-doses-of-
vitamin-c...](https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/high-doses-of-vitamin-c-
shown-to-reduce-duration-of-colds-033117.html)

After reading about it i tried this, and confirm that high doses help to cure
colds much faster. In 2 of three cases i managed to get over a cold which
otherwise lasts 7-10 days for me in just 3-4 days with much lower symptoms.
The dose at which this begins to work is 3g (yes 3000mg!) per day - i take
6x1g the first day, then 3g/day a few days more. Pure Vitamin C powder with no
other additives(many products nowadays are combinations, in spain where i am
right now, the pure powder is hard to get, in Germany it’s in every
drugstore). It works even better with herpes i sometimes get on the lips.
Here, the success rate of making the illness last 2-3 days instead of 10 is
100% since i started do treat it that way a few years ago, with much less
symptoms, just a little itching, no big wounds for many days like many suffer
from (and i did) when getting a herpes push.

I can clearly understand why this is not researched and communicated much - a
pot of 100g Vitamin C powder, good for about 5 such treatments costs just 3€
... not much money to be made.

EDIT:

This is my _personal_ experience - for which I don't claim general
applicability for everyone. But I find it very interesting that some people
see the urgent need to downvote a post where someone reports personal
experience, without saying it must be generally applicable.

~~~
rwmj
This has been debunked extensively, eg:
[http://www.yalescientific.org/2015/03/mythbusters-does-
vitam...](http://www.yalescientific.org/2015/03/mythbusters-does-vitamin-c-
really-help/)
[https://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/pauling.h...](https://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/pauling.html)

~~~
hennsen
Oh really - It has been proven that it does not work for _me personally_
exactly as i wrote?

I didn’t see the researcher team coming through my door...

I didn’t say it works for everyone, but only report how it turns out for me.

Interesting that some find a personal report enough reason to downvote...

How do we know the research you point at is not sponsored by those with an
interest in selling more expensive stuff?

~~~
skosch
You are getting downvoted because pseudomedicine, including the idea that
Vitamin C cures diseases, causes real harm. Low-information patients reject
proven therapies in favour of quackery and make their ailments worse,
ultimately leading to higher costs for all of society.

"It may not work for everyone but it works for me" is a fallacy – if you run a
50/50 blind study on yourself for the next 30 colds you catch, controlling for
factors like season, air quality, stress levels, sleep, and nutrition, and you
still find that Vitamin C consistently cuts your colds in half, _then_ we'll
believe you. Otherwise, stop pushing misinformation.

~~~
hennsen
Strong argumentation... with just a few logical errors...

Unless you can prove what I wrote didn’t happen to me, i can as well insult
you of pushing misinformation about what happened to me and what not.

I talk about personal experience and clearly mark it as such.

And then, i didnt know this is a forum of „low-information patients“ - but i
start to believe it...

Furthermore it has been said in the article that there is no verified cure for
colds. Insofar even if someone would refuse to take other non-verified, more
expensive medications because of my report, it wouldn’t do harm. It’s just
changing one unverified cure against another.

do i talk about cancer? No. It’s about colds.

Believing only in studies will not help you at all - many studies have been
proven to be false for many different reasons and later detected errors. Just
happened for cancer studies of multiple decades!

So with your randomly selected criteria there‘s still many things that can be
wrong, and the same goes for all studies that prove Vitamin C helps and those
that prove it doesn’t. You forgot age, for example... 30 colds is at least 3,
at my current rate rather 10-15 years... a lot changes in a body. I can be
weaker due age, or fitter due more sports etc...

So i believe only in what works for me, and i report about it personally with
clear marking that it’s just that, personal experience.

And i didn‘t recommend anything to anyone else.

Also, i said that success rate is just 2/3\. THAT would have been a good point
to attack my idea that Vitamin C helps - because it is actually a low rate.

While we discuss this, a lot of money is spend for other cures of cold that
equally has no proof of working. But this is accepted... you might be better
off trying to stop big pharma for advertising anything as a cure for cold
instead of insulting me for telling personal experiences.

~~~
newlyretired
What makes you think it was the Vitamin C that prevented the cold? It could as
easily have been your belief in the Vitamin C cure that prevented the colds.

~~~
hennsen
It could.

Who knows if there was actually Vitamin C contained in what i bought?

But my experience still exists.

I took that stuff that has been sold to me as Vit C and had a lot less to
suffer. Didn’t spend a lot of money, and didn’t have a lot of risk involved.

So what?

I tried other remedies before - as well ones that were organical stuff
recommended by someone ( ginger tea for example which some believe in is
helping a lot - but not myself ) as well as commercial products. I believed or
at least hoped they‘d help in each case. But only this did with _some_ \- and
i say 66% is not great, just some - reproducability.

With Herpes it‘s 100% were in my personal experience it removes a lot if
suffering and bad feeling for days.

~~~
newlyretired
My point wasn't to deny your experience, only to comment that even for your
specific experience it's impossible to be so confident as to state it was
Vitamin C that prevented illnesses.

I'm happy you found something that works for you, but the certainty you
ascribe to causes is not justified by the evidence.

~~~
hennsen
Thanks ;)

yes sure, it can be many things - and a repeatability of 2 in 3 is not very
much... just some.

It can also be that as the original article mentions there are many causes for
a bad cold, that my system worked only with a part of them.

I just get a bit upset with (some other) people saying my personal experience
isn't a properly conducted study - it sure isn't.

At the same time, these studies fail every day, in the end they are all just
statistics, which can be forged, lead to wrong assumptions, or just be flawed
in a failure criterion not being thought of until now - like, oh, 30,000
cancer studies... [http://www.sciencealert.com/more-than-30-000-scientific-
stud...](http://www.sciencealert.com/more-than-30-000-scientific-studies-
could-be-wrong-due-to-contaminated-undying-cells)

But I'm not even talking about cancer - and I sure would defintely rather try
fighting cancer with a "western medicine" approach that has some reasonable
success rate and never recommend anyone diagnosed with such trying to treat
that thing with a spoon of Vitamin C everyday...

------
tcj_phx
What if our approach to viruses is basically-wrong?

I grew up before children were vaccinated against chicken pox. When I was
about 5-6 years old, I had a case... Mom counted 12 pox, which was enough to
assume that I'd be immune for the rest of my life.

Some children are covered with chickenpox... Heard a story of someone who
scratched their eye out. The mother of six children told me her oldest had a
horrible case, but her subsequent children each had a less-severe case than
the previous.

One theory is that winter diseases stem from decreased sunlight... Less
ultraviolet light -> less vitamin D. Red light is also important. A few years
ago there was an outbreak of chickenpox amongst some baseball players who came
from Central America, where chickenpox is not a problem.

On account of my experience with chickenpox, and the institution of mass
vaccination of children & adults against the horrible chickenpox virus (99.99%
survivable)... Shouldn't we be looking at what makes people vulnerable to
colds? Virus exposure might not actually be important. From the article:

> In 1984, researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison decided to
> investigate one of the best-known ways of catching a cold. They infected
> volunteers with a cold virus and instructed them to kiss healthy test
> subjects on the mouth for at least one minute. (The instruction for
> participants was to use whichever technique was “most natural”.) Sixteen
> healthy volunteers were kissed by people with colds. _The result: just one
> confirmed infection._ (emphasis added)

I heard of an investigation in Central America that found providing clean
water, outhouses, and basic nutrients was the most important public health
intervention that could be done for a village.

