It’s a pretty good plan to keep your immune system functioning at a high level all year, but especially during the cold and flu season, it’s germane to keep it up and running to fight against germs! (Pun fully intended).
First things first, what is your immune system and what does it do? John Hopkins Medicine defines it as the body’s protection system against outside invaders such as bacteria, fungi, viruses, and toxins (microbes) and is composed of different organs, cells and proteins that work together. Pretty much, it’s your bodies first defender against the stuff that makes us sick.
When your immune system is functioning from its optimum capacity, your body has the highest chance to stave off colds and sickness. When your immune system has been compromised your body is susceptible to autoimmune diseases where the body actually attacks itself. Keeping your immune system running strong and smoothly is so important as it does more than just keeping you from catching the common cold.
Your immune system is comprised of the lymphatic and complement systems, the spleen, thymus, bone marrow, white blood cells (aka lymphocytes), and antibodies. Look back to week 2 if you would like a quick recall on what the lymphatic system does and its correlating importance to the immune system since it flushes toxins, microbes and build-up from the body.
White blood cells are produced in the bone marrow and move through the blood and tissue searching for foreign invaders. If they find any, they attack. The white blood cells are part of the immune system, but because they are also in the blood they also get filtered through the spleen, which removes these viruses and such. The thymus plays its role in the immune system by filtering blood contents and creating the T-cytes. Each organ needs to be kept healthy so it can play its role in keeping the role of the body healthy! If we have learned nothing else, no system in our body has autonomy from any other system and they are constantly aiding one another along.
Interestingly, and impeccably importantly, enough, your immune system has a “memory” or a running log of all of the microbe it has ever caught and fought. This log is stored in the B and T-lymphocytes, types of white blood cells, which can attack any intruding virus that you have previously had, before it can multiply.
Take for example the H1N1 virus that spread in 2009. PubMed’s records showed 76% of deaths occurred in persons aged 18-65 years, and 9% occurred in persons aged ≥ 65 years. The CDC released a report after the pandemic stating:
The (H1N1)pdm09 virus was very different from H1N1 viruses that were circulating at the time of the pandemic. Few young people had any existing immunity (as detected by antibody response) to the (H1N1)pdm09 virus, but nearly one-third of people over 60 years old had antibodies against this virus, likely from exposure to an older H1N1 virus earlier in their lives.
This H1N1 virus proved that even decades later, your body will still have the antibodies to fight off a virus it has already seen before. The main underlying medical conditions for adults was chronic lung disease, which as we have seen with Covid-19, should most drastically effect adults, but because adults over 60 had already acquired this immunity from when the first virus went around when they were little, they were spared the second time.
So, what happens when we don’t take care of our immune system, and I’m saying for a long time here? Yes, we can get sick, but the bigger concern is autoimmune diseases. Lupus, Celiac Disease, Arthritis, Multiple Sclerosis, Type 1 Diabetes, Grave’s Disease (thyroid overproduces hormones- mostly effects women) are all autoimmune diseases. This is where your body literally starts to attack itself. For a further study on what an autoimmune disease is and how they can start, I would recommend reading this article!
Honey, ginger, garlic, angelica, elderberry, echinacea and oregano are all herbs that have been found to help aid in supporting a healthy immune system as they are. Many of these can even be added to a tea, taken raw (if you’re really brave with the garlic!) or taken as a supplement.
Also eating healthy, especially if you are sick, is super important in maintaining that well working immune system. Eating dairy products when you are sick is determinate to a quick recovery as it is mucus forming, making your body have to work harder to move the gunk out and past that mucus (which can trap those viruses and bacteria). And sugar is TERRIBLE to eat when you are sick. According to Amie at The Naturopath sugar has a similar enough structure to Vitamin C that instead of the white blood cells assimilating the vitamin, they instead pick up the sugar molecule. This inhibits your white blood cells ability from working at their highest capacity; dropping your immune system and allowing viruses and bacteria to enter the body.
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