Could a Virus Make You Fat?

Can a common virus make you fat? Dr. Magdelena Pasarica of the Pennington Biomedical Research Centre in Baton Rouge, Louisiana believes this may be the case. Her team, led by Dr. Nikhil Dhurandhar, found that the human adenovirus-36 (Ad-36) which causes cold and eye infections, has the capability to transform adult stem cells obtained from fat tissue into fat cells. Not all people that are exposed to the virus will become obese though. In an earlier study by Dr. Dhurandhar, 30% of obese people were infected with the Ad-36 virus compared to only 11% of non-obese individuals.

The exact mechanism that causes some individuals become obese whereas others do not needs to be determined by further research. As well, it is not known how long the virus remains in the body of obese individuals, and how long its effects last. In a recent study, animals infected with the virus were obese up to six months after the infection cleared.

Dr.’s Pasarica and Dhurandhar call this kind of obesity “infectobesity” and envision that after further research, a vaccine could be ready for testing within five to ten years.

References

Pasarica and Dhurandhar (2007). Infectobesity: obesity of infectious origin. Adv Food Nutr Res; 52:61-102.

Highfield, R (2007) Being fat may be catching, a new study reveals. Available online from http://www.telegraph.co.uk [Cited Aug 21, 2007].