Zoinks.
Scientists have discovered that exposure to a common pollutant may make people more likely to experience severe symptoms from swine flu — and it’s a pollutant emitted in large quantities by coal-burning power plants and other industrial facilities.
The culprit is arsenic, a highly poisonous semi-metal which, according to a new study by researchers at the Marine Biological Laboratory and Dartmouth Medical School, compromises a person’s ability to mount an immune response to the H1N1 swine flu virus.
Most disturbingly, the study — published last month in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives — found that arsenic can weaken the immune response to swine flu even in the low-level exposure levels that are commonly found in contaminated drinking water.
More from the The Institute for Southern Studies.
In related news: Child who attended Harris YMCA tests positive for Swine Flu
This article appears in Jul 28 – Aug 4, 2009.
Tell us what you think of the swine flu pandemic at:
http://www.swineflubritain.co.uk/#/the-latest/4534949965
Swine flu’s BIG helper in this ares of appalachia is tobbaco use way more than coal fired power plants.