WASHINGTON — It sure seems as though people get more colds in cold weather. But then again, many people say that since the common cold is a virus, outdoor temperature doesn’t matter.
It turns out, the put-on-a-coat crowd may be right on the nose.
Deborah Kotz, health blogger for the Boston Globe, tells WTOP about a Yale University study that suggests that a cold nose is a fertile breeding ground for the cold virus.
The flu spreads in our lungs, but the common cold spreads in our noses, Kotz says, and the immune cells in our nose are “less primed to attack” diseases when it’s cold.
“So if our nose gets cold when we’re outdoors, that could cause it to really grow and divide and populate, and make us sick.”
Kotz adds that the lead researcher of the study, an immunobiologist, “told me that she wears a scarf around her nose every time she goes outdoors in the cold weather.”
The full study can be found at the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Follow @WTOP and @WTOPliving on Twitter and WTOP on Facebook.
