Stimulating defective immune function to perform efficiently is the logical approach to defeating pathogens. Such stimulation is propagandized as unavailable, while in reality the remarkable immunostimulating and antimicrobial properties of lithium and antidepressants were documented in 1981, when I published the first of nine reviews on the topic.

A therapeutic claim is reinforced when the mechanism is known. In this case, minute molecules known as prostaglandins, when produced excessively, depress every component of immune function, and induce microbial replication. In the early nineteen seventies, my late colleague David Horrobin, and others, showed that antidepressants and lithium inhibit prostaglandins. In a review published in 1983, I proposed that to stimulate immune function, an agent must have mood elevating properties.

Lithium has immunostimulating, antiviral and antibacterial properties, antidepressants immunostimulating, antiviral, antibacterial, antiparasite, and fungicidal properties. Lithium may be effective for paronychia, chalazions, bacterial skin infections, urinary tract infections, canker sores, cold sores, and genital herpes, antidepressants for canker sores, cold sores, genital herpes, T.B, and probably malaria and HIV. When antidepressants are added to antiretrovirals, they reduce HIV viral load to undetectable. Lithium has untapped potential in methicillin-resistant staphylococcal infections, (MRSA) hospital acquired infections (HAIs), sepsis, and pressure ulcers (bed sores).

With the threats posed by HIV, HINI, resistant T.B, and the emerging resistance of the malaria parasite to artemisin, the availability of immunostimulation becomes all the more crucial. Both lithium and antidepressants prevent recurrences of flu’ like colds, thus one cannot be sure which to favor for HINI in a particular case, and some clinicians may decide to use both. A few doses could sufficiently stimulate immune function, and reduce viral replication, so as to aid recovery.

My research drew on clinical observation, and the studies of many colleagues indexed in Current Contents, Medline and Pubmed. Given the perils, one should question the motives of diehards insisting on, “Large scale randomized clinical trials” or “epidemiological studies.” Release of my book, “Stimulating Immune Function to Kill Viruses” is imminent.