Do we need our tonsils?

Do we need our tonsils?

Humans have been taking our tonsils out for a remarkably long time. The first tonsil extractions date back thousands of years, to at least early Hindu medicine practices, and later to the Roman empire. With the advance of surgical methods, tonsillectomies became commonplace in the 20th century. They were once so widely recommended that, in 1921, a Manhattan hospital opened dedicated solely to performing the procedure in poor children. Wealthy do…