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Cleanliness 'Leads To Diabetes'
posted 04/22/04
Diseases such as diabetes could be caused by children being
too clean, researchers have suggested.
Scientists from the Scripps Research Institute in California, say being exposed
to too few germs means the immune system is not stimulated enough. Writing in
Cell, they say this means the body then has too few immune cells. However, other
studies have said there are enough cells, but because they have not "met" germs,
they are not fully equipped to fight future infections.
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We know that children who go to day nurseries in
their early life are less likely to develop Type 1 diabetes Dr Mark
Peakman, King's and St. Thomas' School of Medicine
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Both theories are attempting to explain why in Type 1
diabetes, T cells turn on the body, attacking and kill beta cells in the
pancreas, the body's source of insulin.
The Scripps researchers suggest that the lack of exposure to bacteria and
viruses means the immune system does not work hard enough, creating a condition
known as lymphopenia, where there is a reduction in the number of T cells in the
body.
They suggest people with autoimmune diseases like Type 1 diabetes, lupus, and
rheumatoid arthritis often have low T cell numbers. They say it might be
possible to reduce the chance that people will become ill by "priming" the
immune system with germs.
The researchers studied mice living in an extremely sterile environment which
had been genetically modified so they were prone to developing diabetes. But
when the mice were exposed to bacteria, their T cell count increased and
curtailed the development of diabetes in the mice. They say the protection
against diabetes resulted from exposure to these pathogens because it kept the
body full of immune cells.
Nora Sarvetnick, professor of immunology at Scripps, who led the research, said:
"Autoimmunity has [traditionally] been considered a condition of too much
stimulation. "What we are seeing is that it is a condition of too little
stimulation."
According to Sarvetnick's and King's hypothesis, the protection against diabetes
results from exposure to these pathogens because it keeps the body full of
immune cells. Increased numbers of T cells act as a buffer against the emergence
of self-reactive T cells by shutting down homeostatic expansion.
This hypothesis could explain a discrepancy in the number of cases of autoimmune disease in developed and developing countries. Disease rates have been on the rise in developed countries in the last 50 years compared to their developing neighbors, presumably because people in less developed countries are exposed to more pathogens.
"The cleaner everyone is, the less stimulation their immune system gets," says Sarvetnick. "Their immune system tends to be incomplete."
Dr Patricia McKinney, of the University of Leeds added other research had suggested childhood exposure to bacteria and viruses protected against diabetes. She said: "We know that children who go to day nurseries in their early life are less likely to develop Type 1 diabetes."
Source: Diabetes In Control.com: Journal Cell April 16, 2004.
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