Can a Virus Make you Fat?

"A University of Wisconsin-Madison study “found that the human adenovirus Ad-37 causes obesity in chickens. The finding supports evidence from other studies that two related viruses, Ad-36 and Ad-5, also cause obesity in animals.”
Don’t dismiss out of hand this line of research. The article points out:
other diseases once thought to be the product of environmental factors are now known to stem from infectious agents, such as ulcers, once thought to be the result of stress, the bacteria, H. pylori has now been found to be implicated.
The study says the simultaneous increase in the prevalence of obesity in most countries of the world is difficult to explain by changes in food intake and exercise alone, and suggests that adenoviruses could have contributed. "

Let's hope for a little blue pill that will counteract it.

http://www.austinbay.net/blog/index.php?p=868