Kate Pan

BIOL 469
Daily #2
As is the case with most actions in life, treating fever is not something one can say is
always bad or always good. Nesse talks in his 2000 paper about fever as a graded defense, but
since the issue here is whether to treat fever or not, it can be put in terms of an all-or-nothing
response since it is essentially a choice between allowing the fever or getting rid of it. In that
case, the variables to consider are the cost of mounting defense against the cost of the harm; the
probability of harm is not especially relevant in this case assuming that the host is already
infected since a fever is already running. Hasday et al points out that in situations that are not
life-threatening, fever has beneficial effects, and treating it actually worsens the infected persons
recovery time. Thus, in such cases, it is normally better to not treat fevers since that would
heighten the cost of the harm. However, sometimes, humans might choose other priorities over
their own health, like if they need to meet a deadline on an important project and having a fever
is distracting them from being fully productive, which could be considered a part of the cost of
the defense. If the cost of the defense is perceived to be more than that of the harm at that time,
then the fever should be treated. In life-threatening situations, Hasday et al explains that fever is
not as consistently beneficial as with non-life-threatening situations. The principle still remains
the same even in this case, though: what is important to consider is the cost of the defense versus
the cost of harm. At some point, the fever itself may be doing harm through using up too much
energy or collateral damage, so the cost of harm previously mentioned should be specified to
be harm from the external pathogen. As before, the decision of whether or not to treat the fever
should depend on whether the cost of the defense exceeds that of the cost of pathogenic harm; if
it does, then it should be treated, but if not, it should be left well alone.