No cure so you gotta rest. Nose is stuffed so you gotta mouth breathe. Throat is dry from mouth breathing. Dry throat makes it painful to swallow. Pain keeps you from sleeping and recovering. Lack of sleep leads to worse symptoms like piercing headaches. Need to rest to get rid of the headaches. Headache and swallowing is too painful to rest properly. Lack of rest perpetuates headaches, nose congestion, dry throat, painful swallowing.
What is this BS
With these symptoms you can’t run, you can’t hunt, you can’t burn too many calories. Your body does everything in its power to prevent you from using resources your body needs to defeat the sickness.
That’s the reason why placebo meds work: the fact that the doctor gave you medicine means that you are really sick, and therefore you have to rest. In reality you’re behaving differently and therefore you’ll get healthy faster.
Oh: and you’re slightly dehydrated so you don’t have that much risk of infecting others.
We are tribal animals. Apes together strong. We care for the sick ones because that means they can focus on recovery.
Is that why placebos work? I could swear they had done studies that show that placebos can be as effective as medication under certain conditions, all other things being equal. Maybe not as effective as medication, but more effective than non-treatment.
I found a study some time ago about pets and placebos, where the subscription of meds for the pet resulted in different behavior by the pet owner, I couldn’t find it but here’s an article about it: https://www.veterinaryprescriber.org/free-articles/the-caregiver-placebo-effect-in-osteoarthritis-treatments
Good find. Key paragraph:
Objective measurements are one way to detect this effect. Another would be a true double-blind trial where neither owner nor vet knows which medicine was given.
Only if the medication doesn’t work. The evidence is that placebos don’t work. Mostly, the placebo effect is a statistical illusion.
It is plausible that the body will expend more energy to combat a disease if you are (sub-)consciously convinced that you are cared for and don’t need to stress. Stress hormones down-regulate the immune response. Cortisol, used for treatment of autoimmune disorders like asthma and allergies, is a stress hormone.
But a sham treatment could also have the opposite effect. If your subconscious understands that as a signal that you must get back into action, you may end up releasing stress hormones. These psychological effects are just too idiosyncratic and fickle to be used reliably.
Stuff like broken bones or cancer doesn’t respond to psychology at all. The body is already doing all it can.
ETA: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7156905/