Why has it been so difficult to find or create a cure for the common cold?!
Question: Because it mutates and changes itself so frequently, we can't treat it. We can only treat the symptoms of the disease.
Answers: Because it mutates and changes itself so frequently, we can't treat it. We can only treat the symptoms of the disease.
There are like 100,000? different strands of it that are constantly evolving.
As I understand it, there are around 800 varieties of the cold causing Rino virus. Once you get a cold caused by a virus, you won't ever catch a cold from that virus again. But the other 799, watch out. So, you can catch up to 800 colds in your life. To cure the cold, you would have to have 800 different inoculations. Being that the cold is so rarely fatal, the money is not there for the development for every strain of virus. 800 different shots could really cost you both in money and pain. Let's not even get into the possible side effects of having 800 different inoculations.
because the virus kept changing the strains e.g. rhinovirus that responsible for common cold. immunity to one strain does not provide immunity to all of them as they do not all share the same antigens.