X-Message-Number: 17858
Date: Wed, 07 Nov 2001 12:17:50 +1100
From: Damien Broderick <>
Subject: heart disease

At 10:00 AM 11/6/01 -0000, John Grigg wrote:

>Pioneering heart disease researcher in the use of genetic therapy, Dr 
>Jeffrey Isner died suddenly of a heart attack on the morning of October 31, 
>2001.  He was only fifty-three.

>Dr. Joel Wallach[...]
>told story after story in a gregarious yet chilling way, of cardiac doctors 
>who died of unforeseen heart attacks while only in middle age.

>What do you folks think?

I think it's all too possible that some cardiac disease is viral, and that
hanging around sick and dying patients might expose their doctors to
increased risk of early death. This is a horrid thought for heart
specialists, but perhaps a hopeful one in the long run, if we could chase
down such an infectious agent and learn to immunize against it.

(I've also long been fond of the idea that schizophrenia might be due to a
[perhaps prionic] `slow virus'; commonplace sardonic suspicions about
psychiatrists do rise to mind...)

Damien Broderick

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