Why colds are sweeping your office

: “Offices whose workers are ravaged by a series of autumn coughs and sneezes may be hotbeds of chronic stress, warn scientists.

Any increase in the number of blocked noses and colds could well be due to the increased pressures of modern life, they say.

One expert even believes that the events of 11 September may lead to more colds and flu this year as the threat of terrorist attack adds to the general burden of winter worries.”

I’m actually more concerned about the converse message, that we need healthy immune systems to cope with the current crisis. While the field of neuropsychoimmunology attempts to articulate the little-understood links between the immune system and cognitive-emotional functioning, this new meme is popping up in all sorts of less sophisticated ways, e.g. television advertisements for vitamin supplements. (“Now, more than ever…”) One more group of profiteers blatantly exploiting fears of bioterrorism, little more.