The Myth...

The Myth of the Common Myth of Common Colds in the Cold

Those old wives sure can spread some pervasive rumours. Don't go swimming 20 minutes after eating and eat carrots for night vision. No smartass who knows its just a rumour can resist letting loose as soon as it crosses the conversation. For further laughs there is also the siren in the quiz show QI... you know the one. In particular I went beyond thinking about the old wives warning to "wear a jumper, else you will catch a cold!"

So now we all accept it as a myth, cold weather does not give you a cold! "Its just a name darling"... the new-age wives would chuckle. Its always wise to rug up in the winter, of course. But apparently this is merely to stave off the risks of the much worse hypothermia and pneumonia. Funnily, its not often you hear of someone getting pneumonia because they left their jacket on the bus.

So it goes more directly: "physically being cold does not make it more likely for you to catch the cold." I have always been skeptical of this common wisdom. But with sticklers like this, I find I just never quite get around to googling them. But today was the day, owing to a combination of being on holidays, and the tendency to have inane debates of curiosity with my partner. I daresay its also relevant that I am going through my first European winter. Hence, here I am in Latvia where the city streets are snow-lined and I have a slight tickle in my throat.

Thus arises the perfect conditions for a literature review, through the lens of New Scientist and Science Daily. Its hard to get real facts from Yahoo! Answers after all.

Ten years ago we didn't have much knowledge, or scientific funding apparently, concerning the reason for winter seasonality of Rhinovirus (common cold) and Influenza. We all know it of course - we are hardly surprised when we see pharmacies installing three extra-tall shelving units of paracetamol every winter.

The mystery was somewhat settled by Lowen et. al. (2007) in their paper. They found that the flu virus is transmitted more effectively in dry air. Their tests (using guinea pigs; quite novel for their field) also suggested that colder noses take longer to shed the virus.

So its no coincidence that colds spread in cold weather. Smoking gun? Almost.

Indeed, the real smackdown wasn't delivered until very recently, by Foxman et. al. (2014). Researchers established that when your nose is cold, your immune defenses are reduced. This makes you more likely to catch the common cold. ZING! As someone who used to battle with well-above-the-average number of colds per winter, it feels sweet to say I was right. Sorry to everyone for being so demanding as to ask for an extra blanket when I stayed the night, but I was on to something!

Lets get all full-circle. This is where the meta magic happens between the blogger and blogee. Stay with me to reflect on my journey. I went forward, beyond the conventional wisdom, skipped past Fox News and Yahoo!Answers and stopped at the last accessible frontier before Google Scholar. This is the realm of the Smithsonians, Scientific Americans and the New Scientists. But it turns out it was by far the long road to the answer. I could have gotten there quicker if I went backwards from the conventional wisdom and just stuck with the old wives tale.

To perpetuate the mildly interesting dinnertime discussion of myths, I'm going to create one here. I heard it from an old wife, I swear. After all, I've been spending more time in their knitting circles recently. As the tale goes:
You are far more likely to google your long-lived curiosities while on holiday.

Sources I actually read
1. Smithsonian Magazine (2015) "...Cold Weather Could Cause Colds" http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/there-…

2. New Scientist (2008). "Cold Weather Really Does Spread The Flu" https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12808-co… [Accessed Dec 2015]

Scientific Research Appropriated by Above Sources
3. Lowen et. al. (2007) "Influenza Virus Transmission Is Dependent on Relative Humidity and Temperature"
4. Foxman et. al. (2014) "Temperature-dependent innate defense against the common cold virus limits viral replication at warm temperature in mouse airway cells"Read more