By David Blyweiss, M.D., Advanced Natural Wellness

November 9, 2020

With our current pandemic, it’s easy to see viruses as the enemy.  They seem like something to be feared, hated, and avoided at all costs.

I get it.

But viruses don’t have to be the bad guys.  In fact, you might be surprised by the important role they have played in our own human evolution.

If you look closely at the cells in our own human bodies, 90% of them are not human in origin.  Instead, they are microbial.

And 8 to 10% of these microbial cells are actually made up of genetic material first found in retroviruses.

Viruses are the most abundant biological entity on Earth.  They outnumber all other lifeforms on the planetary biosphere… combined!

And if you’re interested in studying genetic diversity, viruses contain the largest reservoir of unexplored material.

They act as an important natural means of transferring genes between species.  This increases the genetic diversity and strengthens species with a large enough genome of environmental stressors.

So, viruses may start out as our genetic enemies, but that changes over time. Some of their fragments embedded in our genome become our slaves — making proteins, turning on genes, and helping us thrive.

Good Virus or Bad Virus?

When looking at the virus that is causing our current pandemic, SARS-CoV2, it’s easy to think of it as a bad virus.  And it certainly has done a lot of damage in our world.

Part of its origin story has to do with the specific stressors in the environment where it first showed its face.

The soils in the region are poor quality with heavy use of the herbicide glyphosate, livestock are raised with lots of antibiotics, and there is a huge population and pollution in the nearby city of Beijing.

Add that all together and a doctor named Zach Bush actually predicted that our next viral outbreak would come from the area around Wuhan, China.(1)

Unfortunately, when a new virus like SARS-CoV-2 comes out, it will claim the lives of many people. Those who survive will be stronger or have genetic mutations that allow us to resist.

This, in turn, causes the virus to mutate so it can give us its genetic material.  It also gives this genetic information to the bacteria in our microbiome.

Over the next year or so, as COVID-19 gets weaker in its mortality rate, it may increase its infectivity rate.  In other words, it will become more infectious, but less deadly.  This is because the virus wants to spread to as many people as possible…changing into an endemic virus like the flu circulating among the population.

This whole process means that viruses are like an “in-road.”  They provide a method for the environment to pass along genetic material to the people and animals living on the planet.

So if you look at things on the short-term, say during a human lifetime, viruses have negative often terrible effects.  But crossing the bridge of time, they become a strong force of evolution – active in our species today and impacting our future.

If you’d like to see another example of viruses doing some good in the world, look no farther than your own kids or grandkids.

One of the coolest things, I think, about viruses is this…

You can’t have babies without the help of a virus! Women can’t make a placenta without a protein that originally was given to us by a retrovirus that came millions of years ago. (2)

This ancient virus is no longer inside our bodies.  Instead, its genetic material was coded into our genomes to be passed down to every newborn child.

Think of the information from viruses like “directions enclosed.”  They give us genetic updates from our food, environment, and lifestyle.

Key Takeaways from this Lesson on Virus Evolution

Why am I telling you all of this?

Well, it’s pretty simple.  I want you to understand a bit more about how viruses work in the grand scheme of life.  Hopefully, this will make you less afraid of the natural process.

Most people will make it through this pandemic okay.  You’ll have some level of antibody immunity for at least two months after you’re exposed.  And, as the virus weakens, you’ll be able to deal with it better.

Right now, the greater problem in our world is a “fear-demic.”  Yes, we need to continue the protective measures like mask-wearing, social distancing, and not exposing those most at-risk.

But, I think fear is a bigger factor here than it needs to be.  I know people who have yet to leave their house.  They are suffering from major depression.  Even younger generations, those in their teens and twenties, are suffering from a lack of social interaction with their peers.

So, don’t let fear consume you.  Be smart and understand the process.

While we’re here, I also want to encourage you to keep your immune system stronger.  Work to improve your overall health so things like obesity, diabetes, hypertension, or autoimmune disease don’t make you an easy target.

Eating the right foods and improving your gut health could be your most important disease prevention strategy. (3)

Specifically, you should avoid inflammatory foods like:

• Sugar and high fructose corn syrup
• Artificial trans fats
• Vegetable and seed oils
• Refined carbohydrates
• Excessive alcohol
• Wheat, rye, and barley (sometimes oats)
• Nightshade foods if you have a history of joint pain inflammation

Then, consider taking some of these supplements for your immune health:

• Elderberry, Licorice, Astragalus, Medicinal mushrooms
• Curcumin 500 mg 2 caps twice daily
• Probiotics
• B complex Vitamins
• Vit. C 500 mg. 3-4x a day
• Vit. D3 5,000 iu daily(with Vit.K2)
• Zinc 30mg a day, Selenium 100 mcg/day
• Quercetin 100 mg and/or Green tea 3 cups/day

SOURCES:

• https://zachbushmd.com/video/the-highwire/
• Mi, S (Feb 17, 2000). “Syncytin is a captive retroviral envelope protein involved in human placental morphogenesis”. Nature. 403 (6771): 785–789
• (2014, May 15). The Importance of Microbial Diversity in Gut Health and Disease). Retrieved from http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2014/05/15/microbial-diversity-gut-flora.aspx