[HN Gopher] Doctor advises only using soap on your hands and now... ___________________________________________________________________ Doctor advises only using soap on your hands and nowhere else Author : oska Score : 20 points Date : 2020-07-28 22:32 UTC (28 minutes ago) (HTM) web link (www.theguardian.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.theguardian.com) | m0zg wrote: | This "doctor" has never been in the same room with a 15 year old | who hasn't showered for a week. The "body odor" of that magnitude | should be prohibited under the Geneva Convention. | Tarq0n wrote: | Doctors are required to get a doctorate for their career. This | has two major consequences. For one, research standards are lower | because many doctors are only doing it because it's mandatory, | and there's a lot more people doing simple medical research than | in most other areas of inquiry. This causes a lot of | underqualified opinions to surface for prestigious-sounding | doctors. | | As always, be skeptical of claims that go against consensus. | Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. | TheSpiceIsLife wrote: | I'm a naturopathy by certification, I don't practice because I | prefer to work in my trade. Four years studying in a formal | capacity, Western Herbal Medicine, Clinical Nutrition (diet and | supplements), and enough anatomy & physiology and pathophysiology | to be able to converse with experts in the field and keep up, and | the resulting life-long passion to seek out and critically | analyse new information relating to chemistry, biochemistry, | neurology, immunology, etc etc etc. | | I have fond memories of one lecturer always saying "don't put | anything on your skin you wouldn't put in your mouth _and | swallow_ ". | | Your skin is _permeable_ , the fats and oils the skin exude are | part of it's protective systems, and, as the article points out, | the regular surface of the skin is a veritable smorgasbord of | _commensal_ organisms. | | We should probably stop treating out bodies as fundamentally | broken. They've gotten us this far, and, more generally, you | don't see other animals obsessed with hygiene. Although I did | recently see a video of a rat soaping itself up for a shower, so | there's that I guess. | caturopath wrote: | > don't put anything on your skin you wouldn't put in your | mouth and swallow | | I'd ask this lecturer to join me this weekend as I wade in a | giardia-infested river, toes feeling the silt and mud, but I'm | a bit of a prude and I can only assume they're naked. | | Myself, I'll not hesitate to put on some sunscreen. | Apocryphon wrote: | Animals don't wear clothing, so already we're starting with a | default that's different from nature. It's much easier to trap | in sweat, oils, and other byproducts if you're rubbing up | against fabrics all day. | swinglock wrote: | Also few animals sweat like humans do. | eczema_haver wrote: | I have eczema, and at one point it got so severe from taking | (too-)hot showers, that I could hardly sleep for weeks because of | the discomfort. Out of desperation I gave up showering altogether | so that I could heal. I eventually realized that I didn't really | smell. After my skin healed I didn't resume showering. That was | about four years ago. I've never had anyone (including my partner | whom I live with) tell me I smell under normal circumstances (in | fact I asked my partner directly), nor that my skin looks or | feels oily or abnormal in any way. Same with my hair. I do smell | for a few hours right after vigorous exercise or something, but | it's nothing a little deodorant and a fresh shirt can't fix. | | I don't know if everybody is this way - I'm sure it varies a lot | by body chemistry - but for me at least there have been no | downsides. In addition to saving time, I have to think I've saved | an enormous amount of water. From the article, it sounds like I | may be healthier for it too. | jhloa2 wrote: | This is certainly an interesting perspective. I have a friend | that refuses to wear sunscreen because he feels like the risk to | his health from rubbing all the "unknown chemicals" into his skin | outweigh the health risk of skin cancer. While I still use | sunscreen, his perspective did get me thinking about all the | unknowns I've introduced into my body through the skin. | | Logically, it makes sense that our skin can adapt to be less oily | and odorous with taking a break from using a lot of soap. I've | been only using shampoo to wash my hair every other time I shower | and I've noticed that my hair now seems to take longer to get | oily. It's basically the same concept as using soap on the rest | of our skin. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2020-07-28 23:00 UTC)