An old wives’ tale or a scientific truth?
Caroline:
February 24th, 2007
You may think that your granny was talking rubbish when she advised you to wrap up against the cold in case you caught a chill. I certainly did and used to tell her that colds were caused by viruses and not by getting cold. It seems however, that there may have been an element of truth in her advice. A study at Cardiff University has shown that a group of 90 students who had their feet immersed in cold water for 20 mins caught more than twice the number of colds than the control group. It is not clear why this should happen although it could be that the virus is only activated when the body temperature is lowered to a certain level or that cold feet causes the blood vessels in the nose to constrict and lose its ability to fight the cold virus.