Talk:Immunity (medicine)

This  level-5 vital article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Medicine High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Medicine, which recommends that medicine-related articles follow the Manual of Style for medicine-related articles and that biomedical information in any article use high-quality medical sources. Please visit the project page for details or ask questions at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine.MedicineWikipedia:WikiProject MedicineTemplate:WikiProject Medicinemedicine articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale.

May be better to have different types of passive immunity as separate pages. Snowman 11:08, 20 April 2006 (UTC)thanks 4 da help[reply]

I think it might make more sense to combine these two articles into one "immunity" page since they discuss the same general concepts.--DO11.10 20:31, 26 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I created the page on artifical induction of immunity because there were a lot of pages on the individual section topics in it, but none of them presented their topic as being part of a whole, or a continuum. Some of the discussion and contrary editing around them seemed to me to reflect a lack of appreciation - due, for those who read the material rather than just adding their own, to a lack of coverage of the historical progression. Combining it with other articles is not ridiculous, and building the history of a topic into the current state of the topic page seems not unreasonable. A disadvantage is that the artifical induction article is a convenient length at present, the immunity (medical) one is stubby and I'd expect it to become a very long article particualrly if we get into tailor-made immune molecules and the result is either going to be rather long, cut down inconveniently, or liable to lose detail. On balance I'm against that merger, but interested in discussion. Midgley 11:13, 29 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The proposed merger is in the wrong direction, mind you. Midgley 11:14, 29 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I do agree with you about the lack of continuum in regards to this topic, which is why I combined two pages that were very similar into one page, and attempted to expand this page a bit more (immunity (medical) originally redirected to immune system, which I thought was a bit odd). Although this statement perplexes me: "Some of the discussion and contrary editing around them seemed to me to reflect a lack of appreciation - due, for those who read the material rather than just adding their own, to a lack of coverage of the historical progression." Are you referring to other specific articles, or to me combining the pages that I did? I also agree with your concerns about the page length issue, and on further thought, perhaps the pages should not be merged. Perhaps this page should serve as a summary-type page for the different types of immunity (including history/discoveries of the different types, and bits about humoral and cell-mediated, etc...). "Artificial induction of immunity" could be linked to it as a detail page. Does that sound reasonable?

This page discusses maternal transfer of immunity, which I would have to argue is not "artificial". That is why I suggested the merge direction that I did. Cheers--DO11.10 02:04, 30 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I was referring to some of the editing around vaccine articles and a few others, not here. The placental transfer of maternal immunity prevents artificial induction of immunity to various diseases in the first year or so of life. I agree though it isn't absolutely in the same topic and might even be trimmed. Midgley 21:24, 30 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

...in addition to other problems. But I could be wrong. So I am moving it here until it can be sourced by the author.

Heritagely acquired passive immunity The Sami people(native people of Finland, Norway and Sweden) have an immunity to mosquitos, that they have herited from their forefathers. The immunity has made the blood smell an odor that the mosquitos dont like. --DO11.10 17:53, 4 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If you donate blood are you more vulnerable to getting the flu? If you have recieved the flu vaccine before you have donated blood are you still as resistant to the flu? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Smith152 (talk • contribs) 02:18, 12 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Adoptive transfer" should read "adaptive transfer"?
The subsection "Passive transfer of cell-mediated immunity" begins as follows:"Passive or "adoptive transfer" of cell-mediated immunity, is conferred by the transfer of "sensitized" or activated T-cells from one individual into another."
"Adoptive transfer" should read "adaptive transfer"? --Tossh eng (talk) 05:54, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Single letter difference is not an error. You can find the term adoptive immunity.--Tossh_eng (talk) 05:34, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

At the third category of vaccines, in the last section "Artificially acquired active immunity", it is described that:

• Toxoids are inactivated toxic compounds from micro-organisms in cases where these (rather than the micro-organism itself) cause illness, used prior to an encounter with the toxiod.
  

Would it be that the last phrase reads "used prior to an encounter with the toxin of the organism"? --Tossh eng (talk) 07:42, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The last but one paragraph of the section "History of theories of immunity" begins with as follows:

• The birth of passive immunotherapy may have begun with Mithridates VI of Pontus, who sought to harden himself against poison, and took daily sub-lethal doses of poison to build tolerance.

Then did Mithridates VI make active immunization by incorporating poisons? --Tossh eng (talk) 08:51, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

To take orally the blood of the animals which fed on venomous snakes was done to develop a similar resistance to the animals against the venome. The idea was similar to the reason to take orally other toxins. He just wanted to develop immunity to the toxins. This was aimed at developing active immunity. The immunoglobulin against the venome was of his own. He might have not approached the modern passive immunotherapy, that is, to transfer the immunoglobulin which had specific binding property to the toxin and neutralizing it into the blood himself. This immunoglobulin was of the animal's own. The reason that he also recommended taking orally the blood of animals which fed on poisonous plants might have been similar to the reason above for the snake venome.--Tossh_eng (talk) 12:51, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The pertaining part of the original French text of J. Maleissye's book at page 165^[1] is as follows:

Peut-être a-t-il encore pressenti la sérothérapie en cherchant la meilleure manière de se rendre réfractaire au venin des vipères. La méthode était simple, il ajoutait à son antidote préféré, le sang des animaux réputés pour se nourrir de serpents venimeux, car ces prédateurs étatient présumés dépositaires de l'antidote parfait contre les venins. Le sang devait contenir, selon Mithridate, les principes venimeux atténués ou modifiés car, croyait-il, la prise de venin sous cette forme ne provoquait aucune manifestation d'empoisonnement, mais possédait un effet préventif contre ces types de toxique, en raison de l'immunisation artificielle qu'elle conférait.

Dictionary.com translator robot exhaled the following English:

Perhaps it still had a presentiment of the serotherapy by seeking the best manner of going refractory to venom vipers. The method was simple, it added to its preferred antidote, the blood of the animals considered to nourish poisonous snakes, because these predatory e'tatient supposed agents of the perfect antidote against venoms. Blood was to contain, according to Mithridate, the poisonous principles attenuated or modified because, he believed, the catch of venom in this form did not cause any demonstration of poisoning, but had a preventive effect against these types of poison, because of the artificial immunization which it conferred.

Though it is so much imperfect as English, Mithridates might not think any detoxifying property of the venom in the animal's blood feeding on the snake and he might not think the property was transferred to him by drinking the blood.--Tossh_eng (talk) 14:57, 11 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]