Page 113 - Morgan Housel - The Psychology of Money_ Timeless Lessons on Wealth, Greed, and Happiness-Harriman House Limited (2020)

malaria, since it could be effectively countered with quinine after a few
days of bone-rattling fevers.
COBACOBA

After some tragic trial and error his experiment worked. Wagner-Jauregg
reported that 6 in 10 syphilis patients treated with “malariotherapy”

recovered, compared to around 3 in 10 patients left alone. He won the
Nobel Prize in medicine in 1927. The organization today notes: “The main
work that concerned Wagner-Jauregg throughout his working life was the
endeavour to cure mental disease by inducing a fever.”³³

Penicillin eventually made malariotherapy for syphilis patients obsolete,
thank goodness. But Wagner-Jauregg is one of the only doctors in history
who not only recognized fever’s role in fighting infection, but also
prescribed it as a treatment.

Fevers have always been as feared as they are mysterious. Ancient Romans

worshiped Febris, the Goddess who protected people from fevers. Amulets
were left at temples to placate her, hoping to stave off the next round of
shivers.

But Wagner-Jauregg was onto something. Fevers are not accidental
nuisances. They do play a role in the body’s road to recovery. We now have
better, more scientific evidence of fever’s usefulness in fighting infection. A

one-degree increase in body temperature has been shown to slow the
replication rate of some viruses by a factor of 200. “Numerous investigators
have identified a better outcome among patients who displayed fever,” one
NIH paper writes.³⁴ The Seattle Children’s Hospital includes a section on

its website to educate parents who may panic at the slightest rise in their
child’s temperature: “Fevers turn on the body’s immune system. They help
the body fight infection. Normal fevers between 100° and 104° f are good

for sick children.”³⁵

But that’s where the science ends and reality takes over.

Fever is almost universally seen as a bad thing. They’re treated with drugs
like Tylenol to reduce them as quickly as they appear. Despite millions of
years of evolution as a defense mechanism, no parent, no patient, few