• bleistift2
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    4 days ago

    High temperature isn’t there to kill pathogens. Instead it’s there to help the immune system, because biochemistry (chemistry in general) works better in higher temperatures.

    Source: “Immune” by Philipp Dettmer.

    • Cypher@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7812885/

      Temperatures during a fever can go high enough to damage cells and interferes with normal functions, it also interferes with viral, bacterial and fungal replication and other mechanics.

      Not all chemistry ‘works better’ at higher temperatures with many proteins only functioning well within very narrow temperature ranges.

      • bleistift2
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        4 days ago

        Not all chemistry ‘works better’ at higher temperatures

        I was referring to Arrhenius’ equation. Of course that doesn’t apply anymore when you reach denaturation temperatures. Very high fevers are deadly.