Pets and pests! Your best friend?
"The single-cell parasite Toxoplasma gondii is well known for triggering risky behavior in hosts, in order to facilitate easier transmission, and can cause serious mental and physical conditions. But now this tiny bug that thrives in cats (via rats and birds) has been implicated in accelerating age-related frailty. ...
But even if it lies dormant and largely asymptomatic, scientists believe it may be partly to blame for accelerating age-related frailty, not through the infection itself but the body’s immune system response to its microscopic invader. ..."
But even if it lies dormant and largely asymptomatic, scientists believe it may be partly to blame for accelerating age-related frailty, not through the infection itself but the body’s immune system response to its microscopic invader. ..."
"A common, cat-borne parasite already associated with risk-taking behavior and mental illness in humans may also contribute to exhaustion, loss of muscle mass, and other signs of “frailty” in older adults ...
Approximately 11% to 15% of people in the U.S. have been infected with T. gondii at some point and rates tend to be far higher in older individuals. In some countries, more than 65% have been infected. Once infected, people can unknowingly harbor the parasite for life. ..."
"Abstract
Background
Persistent inflammation related to aging (“inflammaging”) is exacerbated by chronic infections and contributes to frailty in older adults. We hypothesized associations between Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii), a common parasite causing an oligosymptomatic unremitting infection, and frailty, and secondarily between T. gondii and previously reported markers of immune activation in frailty.
Methods
We analyzed available demographic, social, and clinical data in Spanish and Portuguese older adults [N = 601; age: mean (SD) 77.3 (8.0); 61% women]. Plasma T. gondii immunoglobulin G (IgG) serointensity was measured with an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The Fried criteria were used to define frailty status. Validated translations of Mini-Mental State Examination, Geriatric Depression Scale, and the Charlson Comorbidity Index were used to evaluate confounders. Previously analyzed biomarkers that were significantly associated with frailty in both prior reports and the current study, and also related to T. gondii serointensity, were further accounted for in multivariable logistic models with frailty as outcome.
Results
In T. gondii-seropositives, there was a significant positive association between T. gondii IgG serointensity and frailty, accounting for age (p = .0002), and resisting adjustment for multiple successive confounders. Among biomarkers linked with frailty, kynurenine/tryptophan and soluble tumor necrosis factor receptor II were positively associated with T. gondii serointensity in seropositives (p < .05). Associations with other biomarkers were not significant.
Conclusions
This first reported association between T. gondii and frailty is limited by a cross-sectional design and warrants replication. While certain biomarkers of inflammaging were associated with both T. gondii IgG serointensity and frailty, they did not fully mediate the T. gondii–frailty association."
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