> "I'm going to take a wild guess that 90+% of things we describe as 'autoimmune' are in fact initially caused by some bacteria/virus/pollution we haven't yet i

> "I'm going to take a wild guess that 90+% of things we describe as 'autoimmune' are in fact initially caused by some bacteria/virus/pollution we haven't yet identified." Not directly. Autoantibodies are the direct cause of many, if not all, autoimmune diseases. It's possible that certain environmental factors, combined with genetic factors, kickstart autoantibody production. (i.e. are upstream of autoimmune diseases, and causative.) But nobody knows for certain. And the reverse hypothesis is also quite popular: An environment that's too clean, that leaves too little for the immune system to do, can induce a restless immune system into producing autoantibodies. "Idle hands"...