The "cure for the common cold" is a what is referred to as a
Quixotic quest - a lofty goal that sounds noble and
meaningful, but at the end of the day, is a matter of fighting shadows that will never be seen again, and thus, unattainable.
The problem is this - our viral vaccines only work by stimulating our body's own immune responses - causing our bodies to create
antibodies. Antibodies work by creating an exact match
of a particular virus' gene sequence to bind to - like a lock and key, and just like any other lock and key, it requires the
right match to work. You can't just use your key to open your neighbor's door, and vice versa, and antibodies are exactly the same -
they require an exact match.
The reason vaccines cannot work for the common cold is that airborne viruses mutate. That exact match from last year's
(or last month's) cold can be broken when new variations emerge, requiring your body to build new antibodies against it.
Only our bodies themselves can react quickly enough to address the threat.
The flu vaccine is a good example of how ineffective any vaccine against mutating airborne disease will be.
It has been an average of 39% effective over the last 15 years, nearly a supermajority ineffective.
It may give some people a psychological boost to think they are doing something about it,
but a sugar pill
would be about as effective in reality.
Early effectiveness test results had a negative confidence interval as well, suggesting that
the flu vaccine was actually doing more harm than good - making people sick.
The bottom line is that we have had several million years to come up with the cure for the common cold.
There is quite simply nothing new about this year that would make that any more possible than it's ever been.
We only have one way of dealing with airborne illness, which is the same as for any other animals on Earth.
