Influence of body size in animals on health and disease

A great many properties of animals vary in a consistent way with bodyweight (W), for example, rates of production and consumption vary with W 3/4 and the time-spans of biological processes vary with W 1/4. These quite robust principles enable prediction of many aspects of an animal's biology and are established as important practical tools in the fields of nutrition and selection for growth efficiency. They are perhaps underused in the fields of pharmacology, toxicology and anaesthesiology and their implications on pathogenesis, rate of immune response and healing have received very little consideration.