Dirty rant

[fretslider]

I, and I'm sure most of you, have some small degree of experience of this phenomenon.

Put simply, the hygiene hypothesis is a hypothesis that states that a lack of early childhood exposure to infectious agents, symbiotic microorganisms (e.g., gut flora or probiotics), and parasites increases our susceptibility to allergic diseases by suppressing natural development of the immune system. Other diseases, such as the rise of autoimmune diseases and acute lymphoblastic leukemia in young people in the developed world, have also been linked to the hygiene hypothesis.

The hygiene hypothesis has been extensively investigated by immunologists and epidemiologists and has become an important theoretical framework for the study of allergic disorders. It is used to explain the increase in allergic diseases that has been seen since industrialization. For my money, however, de-industrialisation has not reversed the uplift. Work does not provide a solitary uniform environment. An office is a million miles away from the shop floor. The real answer lies in the formative years of childhood.

Ever dropped an ice lolly on the pavement, picked it up and said "ice kills germs"? I and everyone I knew did. The hygiene hypothesis has expanded from eczema and hay fever to include exposure to several varieties of microorganisms and parasites, with which humans coexisted throughout much of our evolutionary history, as necessary for balanced and regulated immune system development. As a kid I played on the (WWII) bomb sites in London. They and the slums weren't really redeveloped until the 60s and early 70s. The white heat of technology and all that.

Now me, I was always covered in mud and dirt and I don't have any allergies - apart from work. Both of my boys have allergies and I'm only too conscious of the changes I lived through and the differences there are between the generations. They are and always have been scrupulously clean unlike their filthy father. I had German measles and Mumps, Chickenpox and all the other kiddie things, not nice, but I and many others got through them. Sometimes some don't. My kids have had all the shots etc... and they haven't had the diseases.

In recent times, the development of hygienic practices, elimination of childhood diseases, antibiotics and effective medical care have diminished or eliminated exposure to these microorganisms and parasites during development. In more recent times, bacteria are beginning to evolve resistance to even last line of defence drugs like Vancomycin. We are going to see an awful lot more bacteria being labelled as superbugs - virtually beyond conventional treatment.

We have rather deluded ourselves that we can wave the antibiotic wand and its all aok. For humans to evolve their resistance to bacteria humans will die. You can't rush a pharmaceutical to market; in the first instance it’s phenomenally expensive, and it takes years. A healthy turnover is made on stock in trade drugs for a wide range of ailments - plus the boon of Viagra related compounds. Why bother with the (financial) risks?

There was a golden age when children could pick up unidentified objects in the street and shove them in their mouths largely unnoticed; when bathing involved the occasional scrub behind the ears whenever you were too slow to wriggle free of your mother's grip; and where snotty-nosed urchins mixed freely, coated in a paste of outside dirt.

I remember it well.

[maggie]

People have germphobias these days. I blame those ridiculous TV adverts for germ killing products that use scare techniques to get mums to buy their products in case their little children are exposed to a germ or dirt!

[Soulman]

I normally take notice of some of the adverts. A lot state that NOTHING works faster/quicker/as well etc........so i often take their advice...and use NOTHING.

[Erasmus]

There's a big difference between dirt and filth. As kids, we couldn't help being dirty because in summer dust was everywhere and in winter it was mud and half of them were helping to muck the cowshed out or load the spuds as soon as they got home. There were other things that might not even be allowed today, like lime and fertilizer blowing across the the fields and on one occasion I remember, the farmer up the road spraying his strawberries in full respirator gear while the spray took off down the road in a choking mist.

The ones that were filthy though mostly lived on a sort of miniature housing estate called the Arsenal (in reality it had been a barracks until about 1925, not an arsenal, which means it was probably built around 1860). Most of the time they were sickly. Similar was true of poor town kids, particularly as it's bounded by cliffs so the air is pretty stagnant and in summer was a haze of exhaust fumes and in winter of coal fumes. In both cases it was a mixture of malnutrition and neglect quite different from good honest country dirt

We did not have most of the immunizations because even the few that had been invented weren't up to much. I think I was done for whooping cough - but I still caught it anyway - and subsequently the measles, scarlet fever, mumps, chicken pox and finally as a teenager German Measles. Diphtheria, we were done for. That was one of the first large-scale immunizations. The one endemic disease we all dreaded because the climate favoured it and it was not until many years later that it was realised that it had nothing to do with unpasteurised milk (of which we skimmed a quart a day for unknown services rendered during the Occupation from what the farmer down the lane reserved for himself in an open tank in the cowshed and made butter of any left the next day) was TB. I think it was eventually blamed on the hordes of feral cats loosely associated with the farms. I didn't get the BCG TB jab until I was 14 because it didn't exist before then (and I had to go to the Maternity Hospital for it)

We also have black (ie plague-carrying) rats. They are clean shy animals that usually live in burrows under the hedges - and raided my sweetcorn crop in the 1980s. We ate things that grew in those hedges too, particularly sorrel (sourgrass) and massacred chestnut trees to get them, though they weren't up to much, especially raw. A fair bit of the food came straight out of the garden, and since the only spray was copper sulphate on the potatoes, if it wasn't to be cooked, it wasn't usually washed either.

Meat was usually a leg of lamb from Sunday to Thursday. Since there was no fridge, it had to live in a perforated zinc and muslin safe outside and get inspected towards the end of its life for any greenish bits to cut off. Occasionally something found its way in and then we had to cut the eggs or maggots out. I have since discovered that maggots are actually little cleaners that eat any putrefaction away and are being used in some hospitals for that purpose. I have rarely eaten anything in my life that made me sick unless it was too rich or made me gag to eat it at all (like crab and milk).

Generally speaking, we managed not to poison ourselves with wild leaves and berries, even if sometimes we overdid it and something had the reputation for being instant death that was quite harmless (most toadstools that didn't look like mushrooms - in fact, it's the ones that do look like mushrooms that are most dangerous for that reason). Between about six and twelve I spent a lot of time fishing with a great-uncle without getting bitten, pinched (a lobster can have your finger off) or putting a hook through myself. A lot of the time I was sculling round the harbour in a twelve-foot rowboat (rowing takes too much space with boats moored close and is too slow - and you can't see where you're going) and managed not to tip myself out of it, just as well since I have never been able to breathe fast enough to swim.

With one exception, we seemed naturally aware of what was a really stupid thing to do (more so possibly than when we were older and thought we knew better). The exception was a girls' game that was always being banned and had claimed one in my mother's time. One girl holds another by the wrists or ankles and swings her round until she's flying. Usually they were in a circle because inevitably the swinger gets dizzy and they have to grab them before they collapse onto what was then an asphalt playground, or somebody lets go. Somebody let go and somebody else went head-first into a wall. But I guess if that's the only serious accident in twenty-odd years, they had it under control.

[fretslider]

"There's a big difference between dirt and filth."

Not to my mother there wasn't. They were entirely interchangeable.

[beth]

There has been a real push to promote squeaky-cleanliness as long as I can remember. I don't remember before dial soap which allowed everyone to eliminate body oder (with a daily shower) to the point coming into contact with a sweaty, stinky pair of sneakers was borderline traumatic.

and

I've had seasonal allergies since adolescence ... though I'm not totally convinced it isn't the fault of chem trails.

OTOH, I remember my mother telling my brother to "hit the shower" and hearing him beg off with "aw mom .. I'm comfortable in my dirt". Amazingly, she sometimes let him get away with a quick wash and I suspect it's because he made her laugh with that excuse . He has few to no allergies.

I have a terrible immune system. My Dr. and I have been together so long we have a sisterly relationship.

Fret, you're a walking wonder.

[fretslider]

Walking yes, wonder... I dunno

[beth]

Oh! Is that one of the bombed out sites?

Even more so that you weren't stabbed or cut or mashed by any number of things ... scrap metal, nails, glass ...

Are you having retro fear flashes, yet?

[Erasmus]

We had this sort of creepy place to explore



A lot of them have been cleaned up and opened to the public now, even provided with replica guns.

[mouse]

Jun 28, 2011 16:06:46 GMT -5 Erasmus said:

). The exception was a girls' game that was always being banned and had claimed one in my mother's time. One girl holds another by the wrists or ankles and swings her round until she's flying. Usually they were in a circle because inevitably the swinger gets dizzy and they have to grab them before they collapse onto what was then an asphalt playground, or somebody lets go. Somebody let go and somebody else went head-first into a wall. But I guess if that's the only serious accident in twenty-odd years, they had it under control.

we used to do that swinging around....my cousins and i used to get filthy playing in the river and in an old ruined house and doing what children used to do
getting dirty was part of childhood it was part of my childrens childhood too
and i tried to ensure my grandsons had a similar type of freedom..the freedom to get dirty the freedom to play

[trubble]

Ever dropped an ice lolly on the pavement, picked it up and said "ice kills germs"? I and everyone I knew did.

Er.. no.

No!

[fretslider]

Jun 29, 2011 5:14:07 GMT -5 @trubble said:

Ever dropped an ice lolly on the pavement, picked it up and said "ice kills germs"? I and everyone I knew did.

Er.. no.

No!

Do I know you?


QED!

[trubble]

We shouted ''4 second rule'' actually.

[mouse]

Jun 28, 2011 16:51:19 GMT -5 fretslider said:

Walking yes, wonder... I dunno

a childrens paradise..

[fretslider]

Jun 29, 2011 7:32:04 GMT -5 @trubble said:

We shouted ''4 second rule'' actually.

Rules?

What kind of childhood was that!