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This idea plays on the fact that human babies get a lot of help for their immune system from their mothers milk. When the mother produces antibodies for specific pathogens. When the baby drinks the milk, the babies also get their antibodies and therefore can fight off those infections.
So, if you
wanted a baby to have a super immune system, all they would need to do is get milk from many different mothers, because each person has different antibodies for different pathogens.
My idea would be that mothers could send in their milk, and the company would mix all of the different milks in a giant vat, then they would send out the milk to the donors and to the stores to sell. Th babies would get the antibodies from the thousands of different mothers, and the babies would become super healthy!
Some details about breast feeding
http://www.drgreene...tion=detail&ref=552
Differences between different time periods, different mothers, different diets. [jutta, Feb 23 2007]
[link]
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I worry that that would lose the benefit of focusing on the pathogens that actually occur in the baby's environment. |
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If you know you're going to take a test tomorrow, and you have a choice of (a) spending two hours practicing for that test, or (b) spending two hours reading a general-knowledge book - which would you pick? |
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The idea of suckling at a wide variety of tits is not without a certain appeal ... |
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//general-knowledge book// |
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I wonder if resistant strains of disease could be encouraged if the immune system is forced to spread itself too thin. |
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I believe for quite a while after being born babies are entirely dependant on the mother's milk - as the child has no immune system for the first few months. |
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This means that the antibodies from the milk are the only ones in the baby's system - thus giving a very weak resistance to a wide range of things, but not a strong resistance where it matters most i.e (as jutta said) against the 'local' pathogens. |
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On top of which, there are theories that living in super clean environments encourage allergies in children, I expect this could have a similar effect. |
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//If you know you're going to take a test tomorrow, and you have a choice of (a) spending two hours practicing for that test, or (b) spending two hours reading a general-knowledge book - which would you pick?// |
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[Jutta], I have a literal answer to your hypothetical question on overbaked! (that one caused me to rant about the quality of the curriculum at our universities) |
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Wasn't there a breast milk bank proposed here before? I cannot find it now. |
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And if the milk sells for a good price, you could start farming the mothers and have your local county special on market shelves. |
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