the premise is wildly disengenious in conflating the pureification of water supplys, and air. a simple set of facts is that humans now represent the largest mass and population of large animals ever to exist. this population inhabits many habitats , both natural and constructed. this population has huge numbers of indivuals who have compromised imune systems. and last, but worst is that humans now constitute a biological niche, and a primary law of biology is the "all niches will be filled"

> Why haven’t we already seen the same kind of transformation with respiratory viruses?

My favorite conspiracy-adjacent theory is that pharmaceutical companies don’t have any intention to give up the multi-billion dollar market of cold and respiratory infections palliatives. Even if there is no ill intent, there are just no market or capitalistic incentives, because a one-shot solution for these pathogens is not going to create a market as rich as the previous one.

To me this is the perfect representation of why believing the market is a positive force is wrong. If not for external pressure, in this case the market clearly signals that it’s best for us all to keep getting colds.

As someone currently with a nasty cold, having to work through it anyhow - please.

No idea of whether those people ar competent, or if it's a PR stunt. Good luck to them. I've joked often enough that "a vaccine for common cold" would have changed my life.

Also, I'm:

- happy that they don't claim the breakthrough will come from AI or Blockchain, for once

- a bit surprised that they got founding by both openAi and Anthropic (so of course they'll try to solve a few things with ai and Blockchain, but,who knows.) Aren't those companies loosing vast amount of money at the moment ? What are they doing philanthropy with ? Just borrowing ? Or are investors for their Series XYZ usually ok with the owner using the money to fund pet projects (even if here, the "pet project" is a good idea, and potentially a good customer/ ?

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It's important to build on solid foundations, rather than on faulty assumptions. My experience is the standard medical approach to lung problems is basically wrong.

There was a submission ~6 years ago about using ethanol to sanitize people's lungs as a treatment for COVID-19. One of the comments shared a college story about how they were coerced into treating their sniffles with a spoon and vodka: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22745834

In early 2020 I started advocating using the classic herbal treatment for lung problems: apple brandy inhaled from a charred oak keg. The theory is simply that the ethanol is an antiseptic, and the apple and oak flavoring compounds stimulate the lungs to repair themselves.

I found a manufacturer and started selling little 3L kegs. My first customer asked, "can I try it?" I warned that the ethanol burns before you get used to it. I was impressed that he was able to fill his lungs with apple brandy fumes without coughing the first time. After a moment of held breath he darted off. When he came back 1 or 2 minutes later he said, "I'll take one".

He was a big guy. His problem was getting winded between his car and the store. That he could walk for one or two minutes on lungs filled with apple brandy fumes, when he couldn't normally walk without getting winded while breathing normally, was incredible.

2 hours later he called back. The husband of the woman he'd been the driver for that day was ~70 year old husband and coughing himself to death with a case of the COPD. He'd quit smoking ~20 years before, but his lungs never recovered.

Both of these men's lung conditions rapidly improved after they started inhaling apple brandy fumes. After he started huffing on apple brandy 4x/day, the COPD fellow's coughs went away, and his skin went from 'gray' to 'pink'. The other fellow caught the COVID-19 in June or July that year. I heard his lung capacity score was fantastic, the virus was just hitting his kidneys. He survived his hospitalization.

The modern tool that facilitates the inhalation of apple brandy is a nebulizer.

Different story: in 2021/2022 I was emailed by a woman who'd found my youtube video. In 2023 she came out to Arizona to visit, then to stay permanently. She always assumed that her lung problems were related to the asbestos she'd inhaled on 9/11. But since she's started using the apple brandy barrel, she's only had to use her inhaler once in the past 3 years: when she got a lung full of hairspray in the gym's bathroom.

As the submission in the link above indicated at the start of COVID-19, treatment with inhaled ethanol is a reasonable initial treatment for respiratory problems.

While I think it’s a noble idea I think much more could be achieved with much smaller amounts of money. Actually zero. Regulate sugar, introduce a HIGH sugar tax. Introduce higher nicotine and alcohol tax. Introduce stricter environmental controls for poisonous materials and water and air pollution. All these things cost essentially zero to implement, they even bring in money and all of them are credible ways to significantly reduce health problems world wide. But eh, I’m not part of a lobbying organisation, so what do I know.

First we need strong immune system for all. This is a huge endeavour that includes exercise, both aerobic and non, low stress and other interventions.

Drugs and medicine play a small role in resp viral infections.