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Wednesday whiplash [status]
Feb. 12th, 2025 11:12 amMaybe I'll have more time this afternoon for a non high-speed, low-budget update.
Yesterday's labs were exhausting. I also needed to do some prep work for one of my classes today, so I didn't get home until fairly late, and then had stress dreams and woke up with swollen lymph nodes, signs of fighting off illness.
The early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic really got me rethinking my approaches to viral illness. I'd grown up with the conventional wisdom of, "No cure for the common cold," so up until then I'd assumed that if and when a person gets sick, you just have to ride it out, managing the symptoms as best you can (lots of tea, soup, etc etc).
But during those early pandemic days, I learned more about the concept of "viral load," where the severity of the course of illness can be related to the amount of viral particles present. And that can also be tied to the extent and types of tissues infected. I'll note that my understanding is the extent of what we know about the impacts of viral load on illness progression, likely depends on the specific virus and isn't particularly clear or easy to study. But on the other claw, the steps it suggests we could/should take when we start to feel sick include things that won't actively cause harm, so there are some good reasons to forge ahead anyway.
Thus, when experiencing early symptoms, in addition to taking the step of extra rest (skipped rowing practice), I've applied Betadine nasal spray to my sinuses (note, this stuff is not directly available in the USA), and zinc lozenges to my throat. In some circumstances, mild exercise (emphasis on mild!) can be immune-activating, so I still biked in to work.
And we're at a point where it's a good idea to think about putting on masks and running air filtration systems in shared indoor spaces, too. After all, it's still winter here, and virus particles can remain viable for longer in cool, dry indoor air.
And now, off to teach.
Yesterday's labs were exhausting. I also needed to do some prep work for one of my classes today, so I didn't get home until fairly late, and then had stress dreams and woke up with swollen lymph nodes, signs of fighting off illness.
The early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic really got me rethinking my approaches to viral illness. I'd grown up with the conventional wisdom of, "No cure for the common cold," so up until then I'd assumed that if and when a person gets sick, you just have to ride it out, managing the symptoms as best you can (lots of tea, soup, etc etc).
But during those early pandemic days, I learned more about the concept of "viral load," where the severity of the course of illness can be related to the amount of viral particles present. And that can also be tied to the extent and types of tissues infected. I'll note that my understanding is the extent of what we know about the impacts of viral load on illness progression, likely depends on the specific virus and isn't particularly clear or easy to study. But on the other claw, the steps it suggests we could/should take when we start to feel sick include things that won't actively cause harm, so there are some good reasons to forge ahead anyway.
Thus, when experiencing early symptoms, in addition to taking the step of extra rest (skipped rowing practice), I've applied Betadine nasal spray to my sinuses (note, this stuff is not directly available in the USA), and zinc lozenges to my throat. In some circumstances, mild exercise (emphasis on mild!) can be immune-activating, so I still biked in to work.
And we're at a point where it's a good idea to think about putting on masks and running air filtration systems in shared indoor spaces, too. After all, it's still winter here, and virus particles can remain viable for longer in cool, dry indoor air.
And now, off to teach.
