Psychological Stress and the Common Cold

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Abstract
The conclusion of Cohen et al. (Aug. 29 issue)1 that stress increases infection rates after an experimental rhinovirus challenge cannot be accepted on the basis of the results presented. Persons with low or absent titers (≤2) of serum neutralizing antibody almost always become infected after an intranasal rhinovirus challenge. In our trials over the past 13 years, 321 of 343 susceptible (i.e., with titers ≤2) control subjects (94 percent) became infected after a challenge.2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 In the study of Cohen et al., infection rates in the antibody-free subjects with high and low scores on the psychological-stress index were comparable (86 and 92 percent, respectively). That infection was not documented in a small percentage of susceptible subjects from the two laboratories could be due in part to technical reasons, such as the inaccuracy of screening antibody tests, poor mixing of viral inoculums, and failure to detect viral shedding in persons who were actually infected. The very high infection rate indicates that nonimmune persons, regardless of their level of psychological stress, lack protective mechanisms in the nose for dealing with rhinovirus.