Large-scale study reveals autoimmune disorders now affect around one in ten

[jemmyw]

So are they increasing or are we just figuring them out more and living longer and keeping more kids alive? I've got a spinal arthritis condition that didn't start until I was mid 30s and it's not a new condition but the thinking around it has changed substantially.

Edit: the consultant I saw said I probably wouldn't get diagnosed 20 years ago when she started. I had trouble convincing my doctor it could be this condition. I'd never have known about it unless I'd mentioned it to my mum who told me my sister (who I don't have contact with) has this quite severely and it took her 10 years to get a diagnosis and access to helpful drugs.

[explorer83]

This study was published from a journal that got caught publishing a questionable study on a major health issue a few years ago that they later had to retract. This was despite their reputation of being one of the best and peer-reviewed. So I don't blame you for questioning it. But I'm a parent with children with issues. And everything we study from other very mainstream sources says their issues are on the rise. These are issues that you can't ignore or not recognize.

[zug_zug]

I looked into this a while back, and I believe there are a number of different autoimmune conditions that are definitely going up with no cause known (corroborated by multiple studies). One is linked

I also am a bit troubled by how quick people are to dismiss such studies. I think people are operating off of a prior of "big shifts in health don't just happen," which in my opinion is a demonstrably false prior. I think the default prior should be "We're in completely new health waters, testing in production, anything is possible and problems are known and not explained."

In particular nobody can explain why eyesight is getting drastically worse. Obesity in the developed world is a big unknown (I think even lab rats weigh more). I believe there's consistent evidence of allergies increasing. And the balance of evidence is that sperm counts are going down, but for whatever reason I think people assume that's a conspiracy theory or just are afraid to believe it.

[1] https://www.academia.edu/download/40579191/ijcd-3-4-8.pdf

[epgui]

Their incidence/prevalence has mostly been increasing (this is known), but yes we are also diagnosing them better.

[hattar]

Spondylitis? I’m curious mostly because I received a similar story and diagnosis, but over the last 5-10 years have had multiple doctors second guess what may be affecting me.

[Amezarak]

Life expectancy after age 5 has not budged much over the centuries, though you’ll find most graphs begin at a trough circa 1900. Prior to that it was about the same as it is now in many countries.

So “we’re living longer” is not the answer, it probably has much more to do with the massive amounts of new chemicals and pollutants we’ve exposed ourselves to. No barriers to transport along with unrestrained trade and frequent migration also mean were exposed to way more pathogens than we evolved to encounter, so some of them could also be blowback from legitimate immune responses.

[zaptheimpaler]

The hygiene hypothesis is pretty well proven now as far as I know. Its the idea that early childhood exposure to various germs is important to tune the immune system correctly. It atleast partially explains the rise of autoimmunity. From the wiki:

The rise of autoimmune diseases and acute lymphoblastic leukemia in young people in the developed world was linked to the hygiene hypothesis.

[Miner49er]

I know one study found celiac is increasing, not just being diagnosed more (although it is also being diagnosed more). I'm not sure of other autoimmune diseases.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701082911.h...

[opmelogy]

Anyone know about this idea about low fiber diets making it easier for bacteria to get through the intestinal lining? And that this bacteria is likely a cause for autoimmune issues?

I read about this about 10 years ago in the NYTimes and haven't seen it in print since. But the last 3 doctors I've seen (in different cities), I've asked them about this and the responses have ranged from "research is showing this is likely the case" and then another one responded with a flat out "yes, that's correct." Yet I don't see anyone actually talking about this.

[nestorD]

Here is a link to the actual paper (it appears that they forgot to link to it in the article):

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

[Gatsky]

Very interesting. The increase in Coeliac disease will mostly be due to the advent of a useful blood test to detect it. The lack of association between other autoimmune diseases and multiple sclerosis fits with the recent identification of Epstein-Barr virus as a probable causative agent. The reduction in pernicious anaemia could be explained by reductions in the prevalence of Helicobacter pylori (due to effective treatment and improvements in food handling).

[Miner49er]

Kind of, we have evidence that there are a lot more people with celiac now. It's not just that people are being diagnosed more.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090701082911.h...

[jjtheblunt]

isn't pernicious anemia also caused by B vitamin deficiency?

[Mikejames]

The foods we eat today have higher amounts of Omega 6. Theres a ratio between omega 6 and omega 3, 3:1, 2:1 for healthy omega 6 to omega 3 balance. when Omega 6 is high it seems to correlate to autoimmune disease and allergic diseases along

processed seed oils are in most foods we eat

[hombre_fatal]

Here’s a look at the human health outcomes of our best research into high-LA seed oils: https://www.the-nutrivore.com/post/a-comprehensive-rebuttal-...

> The notion that modern culinary oils containing high amounts of PUFA, particularly LA, are inflammatory is an idea that has managed to permeate virtually every diet camp imaginable. The paleo/ancestral nuts believe it. The vegan/plant-based nuts believe it. The keto/carnivore nuts believe it. Zealots belonging to Ray Peat's diet cult definitely believe it too. But is there actually evidence for this claim from human experiments?

Intrigued?

Make sure you’re not just regurgitating things to be true that you’ve merely heard repeated a thousand times online. Because that got me too not long ago.

The anti seed oil sophistry is one of the most ubiquitous nutrition misconceptions today. On social media, at least.

[isbwkisbakadqv]

Interesting idea - where do you hear this?

[diordiderot]

Paper?

[callesgg]

The stronger your immune system is the higher are your chances to survival. Until your immune system is so strong it attacks it’s own host.

Evolutionary pressures will make sure that organisms are very close to the edge between to weak and to strong.

One naive way of interpreting this is that 50% of the population will have a immune response that is to strong (above the edge) and 50% to weak (under the edge). But it is naive to say that, as this is a topic that has much more complexities than the one dimensional model that I have described here.

At what percentage the threshold of the statistics for what we call autoimmune disease would be located would be interesting to know.

[AstralStorm]

The study ends in 2019. It will be interesting to compare rates since COVID.

[tehjoker]

Posted this elsewhere, but this study shows a 40% risk increase (population increase from 11% to 15%) in Germany.

https://www.livescience.com/covid-19-linked-to-40-increase-i...

[oigursh]

If only my immune system would attack all the microplastics in my blood.

[0x073]

Then you would be permanent sick.

[saiya-jin]

I don' think you understand a lot of what you write. Microplastics are largely inert and most of them are much much bigger than your immunity cells. If they could somehow 'attack' it, they wouldn't be able to consume it (and if they could nothing would change, just like ink in tattoos remains in cca same place even after immune cells consume it).

What would happen during 'attack' is rather a clot forming, not very good ie in your bloodstream. Kind of pearls forming randomly in your body, but the seed would be a piece of plastic instead of a grain of sand, and it would be just your dead immunity cells around it. The chance of getting rid of it gets much smaller. Now why would you want something like that.

[amelius]

Some people consider frequent blood donations as a way to reduce the amount of foreign particles in their blood.

[ars]

That would be horrible for your health. Massive inflammation and hormonal issues.

Best is if your body ignores the plastic, that would mean the plastic doesn't do anything to you.

[DelightOne]

The body detecting and removing them would be cooler. I wonder whether any mutation anywhere exists that does that.

[thegabriele]

You should watch the latest "Crimes of the future" from Cronenberg (viewer discretion is very advised.)

[moneywoes]

As someone with 3 I believe one factor may be increased testing

[nickdothutton]

_Anecdotally_ I’ve noticed a huge uptick in colleagues and friends with some kind of autoimmune problem in the last 3 years, especially those with severe symptoms. Looking forward to any good study into this problem which was already growing even before the current “covid age”.

[nerdponx]

What are examples of severe symptoms?

I would be interested in seeing some kind of long-term study of the appearance of reported symptoms that are associated with autoimmune disease, and not just the diagnosis of autoimmune disease. If rates of reported symptoms in the population are increasing, Then it's suggestive that the prevalence of disease is increasing, whereas if diagnoses are increasing but reported symptoms or not, it's indicative of better testing and a stable prevalence of disease.

[bjornsing]

Would be interesting to know the exact findings regarding effect of socioeconomic factors. Anybody with access to the paper that could cut-n-paste?

[mbrochh]

Stop. Eating. Carbs. And. All. Processed. Foods. It's. That. Easy.

[quantumwoke]

Mostly this is because we have more reliable tests for autoimmune disease, and more are being discovered. I wouldn’t be quick to jump to a boogeyman like crystals, COVID, fluorine, magical wind chimes as the cause.

[atleastoptimal]

I have a feeling that microplsatics, PFAS, chemical contamination, digestive problems due to modern diets and like the like are all significant precursors to autoimmune disorders.

[semilattice]

I believe we are increasing in the number of autoimmue disorders.

Alergies is a clear sign that these are not 'hidden', 'waiting to be discovered' symptoms.

My personal view is that this a combination of the following top factors (in that order):

1) long-distance travel causing quick spreading of various infections illnesses stressing our immune system

2) Food (too much sugar and carbs)

3) Water and air pollution

4) vaccines 'boosters' chasing immunity to rapidly changing pathogens

[lez]

One factor that you haven't mentioned is government-sponsored, man-made weaponized strains of pathogens, just like Mycoplasma Fermentans Incognitus:

http://www.betterhealthguy.com/images/stories/PDF/PHA/2009_0... (1. article)

[0x486566e7279]

Wouldn’t that mean that infections are also a major source, as more people are infected by virus than are vaccinated by against them? Most vaccines excluding the new MRNA vaccines are just versions of the original virus, dead or weakened.

[AnimalMuppet]

My (pharmacy student) daughter has a plausible theory about that.

Most (all?) vaccines have something in them to make the immune system recognize that there's something there to fight. (It might me called an "adjuvant" or something like that - I'm not the pharmacy student, so I'm probably getting the word wrong.) It's included in the vaccine that you get from the manufacturer.

That was fine, when you only had a very few vaccines to get. But now kids are supposed to get something like 18 different vaccines. Well, doctors know that the mom isn't going to bring their kid in 18 different times to get vaccinated. So they give the kid five different vaccines at a visit.

So the kid gets five doses of the adjuvant (or whatever it's called) at once.

For some kids, that's enough to make their immune system hyperactive. And behold, they develop autoimmune diseases.

As I said, this is a plausible theory. It's not proven. But it makes some sense, and it explains what changed.

[m3kw9]

Diabetes would account for a lot of that increase due to highly process foods with refined sugars/carbs

[terminalcommand]

Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease, you catch regardless of your diet. Even newborn babies can be diagnosed with it.

Type 2 diabetes results from old age, sugar heavy diet etc.

Please learn the difference :(.

[akokanka]

WiFi and other frequencies with which we are bounced daily are to blame

[sowbug]

And solar-generated electricity still carries the dangerous UV radiation. That's why skincare companies are the biggest sponsors of the solar energy revolution.

[Fragoel2]

On the basis of which proof?

[6nf]

Got any studies on this I can read?