Did you know that an autoimmune disease now affects one in five Americans? Of these, 80% are women; autoimmune disease is the fifth leading cause of death in women under 65. Most autoimmune diseases are being diagnosed in increasing numbers, but it is still unclear if all this variance is due to higher awareness, medical literacy, or better diagnosis techniques.

The effects of autoimmune diseases can be devastating. As a person's immune system attacks their body instead of microbes or cancerous cells, they can experience chronic fatigue, chronic pain, drug dependency, depression, and social isolation. These symptoms annihilate mental health, wreck promising careers, destroy lives, and, often, financially ruin families. For too many, these illnesses result in early death.

The Missing Friends

The Old Friends Hypothesis suggests that early and regular exposure to harmless microorganisms—"old friends" present throughout human evolution and recognized by the human immune system—train the immune [...]

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