Angela:   With all due respect, you post a lot that is very beneficial and
obviously put a lot of time and care into your posts here.     I am
therefore disappointed to see you expressing what strikes me as undue
certainty about IMHO overly broad statements such as  L-lysine is not an
effective treatment for herpes simplex virus.

Viruses have different strains and the different strains can respond
significantly different to various things.  In addition Homo sapiens has a
great deal of genetic diversity resulting in a wide range of reactions and
outcomes from the same exposures (pathogenic, environmental, etc.)  On top
of all that, especially in the USA, there is a very broad range of
lifestyles with a large  number of widely ranging variables (diet, climate,
exercise or lack of it, degree of stress, and innumerable more) many of
which can on their own profoundly affect the effects of pathogens (among
other things).  And all that is just a very small sample of a very long
list!

Given the above and given the very large number of HSV patients who have
claimed that Lysine has very significantly helped them,  IMHO the statement
that  "L-lysine is not an effective treatment for herpes simplex virus."
appears to be not only very overbroad and far too certain but actually
harmful (In that such statements might prevent many from using an
inexpensive treatment that for many can be very helpful.

I am one of those for whom (until quite recently) the combination of Lysine
(1 GM 3 times/day) was totally effective in preventing any outbreaks for
many years, _if_ and _only_ if I also avoided chocolate, nuts and large
amounts of caffeine.    For years _for me_ even small amounts of chocolate
and/or nuts would guarentee an outbreak.   Same thing if I quit taking
lysine for more than a week or two.

So it doesn't help everyone.  And who's going to fund a study to show
possible efficacy in _this_ economic system?   No patent is possible, lysine
can be bought very inexpensively OTC from innumerable convenient sources.

I am trying but have a really hard time understanding why you appear to have
a need to deny the possibility that this therapy may have some real benefits
for _some_ HSV patients.

I beg you to please try to be a bit more open minded.    Some of the
increased knowledge you could gain thereby just might prove to be very
useful to you.

Jim

PS:   Why did lysine quit working for me?   It could have been that I was
infected with an additional virus, but because of it's gradually increasing
ineffectiveness I suspect it was rather because my virus slowly evolve a
better version of whatever enzyme was unable to distinguish between lysine
and arginine (my understanding is that the virus needs arginine but its
enzyme (in at least some strains!) is incapable of distinguishing between
them (very similar chemical structure) so the higher the lysine/arginine
ratio the lower the percentage of useful protein it turns out.

PPS:  It could be that I was infected with a different strain of the
_same_virus that had a better version of the relevant enzyme.   **Note that
it is at least theoretically possible for two people with different versions
of the same virus to worsen each others infections**   which might pour cold
water on the notion that there is no need to try to reduce cross infections
if you both have the "same" virus.

But there is a _lot_ of guessing and speculation and unfortunately all too
much of it passes as knowledge.   Disappointingly this is true in science
and most especially true in medicine.   It is, IMHO, wise to keep that in
mind.

For all of us, some of what we "know" to be true is, in fact, false.   What
distinguishes between us is that some of us are more aware of that than
others and some can use that knowledge to make the application of their
knowledge and their acquisition of new knowledge far more effective.

PPPS:  The internet does not allow transmission of tone of voice and other
non-verbal communication and people differ greatly in how much they rely on
those elements for their interpretation of communications.   If anything in
the above causes offense, please consider that that may be due to
misinterpretation rather than intent.

Hi Tom,

Keep us informed on how the food thing goes for you.  I think that people who do
NOT have food as a trigger really have no idea how strong of a problem it can
be.  I have a friend who has an outbreak soon after ingesting ANYthing with
caffeine in it.  The connection is so strong, it can't be denied.

ar

If foods are such a BIG part of outbreaks then how come I eat everything I'm
not supposed to according to "the charts" and don't get outbreaks?

If foods are such a BIG part of outbreaks then how come when I avoided
everything I was supposed to I still got outbreaks?

Angela ;-)