Subject: Back to the bacteria - diabetes type 1 and RA
There was the usual fanfare splash in the Daily Express on Friday that BCG TB jabs may 'cure' type 1 diabetes and stop the destruction of the Pancreas. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/06/150607214244.htm Following the BCG idea - a few minutes googling found me this.... http://www.gutpathogens.com/content/5/1/14 It seems though TB has been studied a lot for molecular mimicry cross reaction reaction in Diabetes as well as RA which I already knew about. So what they are saying is that the BCG vaccine is inducing a tolerant immune response to the TB bacteria - and in doing so is changing the auto immune response to self (pancreas cells) Then I found this - so BCG induces a low inflammatory response to other pathogens - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2265931/ It would not be too far fetched to suggest a couple of things - just a prediction 1) That a BCG booster might work in other diseases including RA 2) That the original cause in SOME auto-immunity may have been the original childhood BCG given the injection when their immune systems were depressed - for example TNF blockers in RA are suggested to be a no-no for BCG boosting This study looks at how TB is present in most people - and higher in RA and that anti-TNF often drug treatment reactivates infection - so explains why people with RA don't often get a BCG jab http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3675964/
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