1) Garlic
– As Good or Better Than Tamiflu?
Feb. 5, 2013
Dr. Mercola
writes
A recent article by PreventDisease.com4 highlighted the use of
garlic, which has natural antiviral,
antibiotic, and antifungal activity.
“Forget the
flu shot. A soup based on more than 50 cloves of garlic, onions, thyme and lemon
will destroy almost any virus that enters its path including colds, flu and even
norovirus,” John Summerly writes.
Garlic has long been hailed for its healing powers, especially against
infectious diseases like cold and flu. This is likely due to its immune
boosting effects. According to the featured article:
“...Compounds in this familiar bulb
kill many organisms, including bacteria and viruses that cause earaches, flu and
colds. Research indicates that garlic is also effective against digestive
ailments and diarrhea... A recent and significant finding from Washington State
University shows that garlic is 100 times more effective than two popular
antibiotics at fighting disease causing bacteria commonly responsible for
foodborne illness.”
The respected research organization
The Cochrane Database, which has repeatedly demonstrated that the science in
support of the flu vaccine is flimsy at best, has also reviewed studies on the
alternatives, such as the use of garlic.5 Unfortunately, such research is harder
to come by, as there’s no financial incentive driving it.
Still, in the singular study
identified by the Cochrane group, those who took garlic daily for three months
had fewer colds than those who took a placebo, and, when they did come down with
a cold, the duration of illness was shorter – an average of 4.5 days compared to
5.5 days for the placebo group.
While this may not seem overly
impressive, it’s still better than the results achieved by the much-advertised
flu drug Tamiflu. If taken within 48 hours of onset of illness, Tamiflu might
reduce the duration of flu symptoms by about a day to a day and a half. That's
the extent of what this $100-plus treatment will get you. It’s virtually
identical to just taking garlic on a regular basis...
However, some patients with influenza
are at increased risk for secondary bacterial infections when on Tamiflu, which
of course would defeat the plan of being able to jump out of bed a day sooner.
Furthermore, adverse events reported include pediatric deaths, serious skin
reactions, and neuropsychiatric events, including suicide committed while
delirious – side effects you won’t experience if you’re taking garlic.
Furthermore, there are plenty of
reasons to doubt the veracity of Tamiflu’s claims. In 2009, conflicts of
interest within WHO were unearthed, showing links between Roche, the
manufacturer of Tamiflu, and those responsible for creating pandemic flu
planning guidelines. Tamiflu is currently on the organization's list of
"essential medicines." But the Cochrane team could
find "no evidence" to suggest that Tamiflu actually reduces complications in
cases of influenza. In fact, eight out of 10 clinical trials on
Tamiflu are still “missing in action,” as Roche has doggedly refused to release
them.
Kind of makes you wonder why,
doesn’t it?
If you love garlic, the featured
article includes a hearty garlic soup recipe, consisting of unpeeled garlic
cloves, olive oil, organic grass-fed butter, cayenne, ginger, onions, thyme,
coconut milk, organic veggie broth, and lemon wedges. For the recipe, please
refer to the original article.6 If you don’t enjoy garlic, you could opt for a
high-quality supplement.
Understanding What Causes Colds and
Influenzas Can Help You Prevent Them
Both colds and various influenzas are
caused by a wide variety of viruses (not bacteria).
While the two ailments typically affect your respiratory tract, there are some
differences between them. Common symptoms of a 'regular cold' include runny
nose, congestion, cough, and sore throat. The symptoms of the flu tend to be far
more severe, as the influenza viruses are capable of causing severe lung
infection, pneumonia and even respiratory failure. They also tend to affect your
joints – hence that allover achy feeling.
The following video offers an
excellent, rapid-fire cliff-notes-type education on flu viruses, where the “H”
and “N” flu classifications come from and their transmission, along with common
flu symptoms. (Bear in mind that I obviously do NOT recommend or advise getting
a flu vaccine, which is listed as one of the prevention methods at the end of
this video.)
The most common way these viruses are
spread is via hand-to-hand contact. For instance, someone with a cold blows
their nose then shakes your hand or touches surfaces that you also touch.
However, the key to remember is that just being exposed to a cold virus does not
mean that you're destined to catch a cold. If your immune system is operating at
its peak, it should actually be quite easy for you to fend off the virus without
ever getting sick. If your immune system is impaired, on the other hand, they
can easily take hold in your body.
So, it's important to understand that
the reason you catch a cold or flu is because your immune system is impaired.
It's not an inevitable event based on exposure alone. Lifestyle factors that can
depress your immune system, alone or in combination, include:
Eating too
much sugar and grains.
The average person consumes about 75
grams of fructose per day (primarily in the form of high fructose corn syrup
found in virtually all processed foods), and when fructose is consumed at that
level it can devastate your immune system.
One of the ways it does this is by
unbalancing your gut flora. Sugar is 'fertilizer' for pathogenic bacteria,
yeast, and fungi that can set your immune system up for an assault by a
respiratory virus. Most people don't realize that 80 percent of your immune
system actually lies in your gastrointestinal tract. That's why controlling your
sugar intake is CRUCIAL for optimizing your immune system.
It would be wise to reduce your total
sugar intake, and limit your fructose consumption to below 25 grams a day if
you're in good health, or below 15 grams a day if you have high blood pressure,
diabetes, heart disease, or are insulin resistant or are seeking to recover from
an acute illness like the flu. Vitamin D deficiency. In the largest and most
nationally representative study7 of its kind to date, involving about 19,000
Americans, people with the lowest vitamin D levels reported having significantly
more recent colds or cases of the flu -- and the risk was even greater for those
with chronic respiratory disorders like asthma. At least five additional studies
also show an inverse association between lower respiratory tract infections and
vitamin D levels. Insufficient sleep. If you aren't getting enough restorative
sleep, you'll be at increased risk for a hostile viral takeover. Your immune
system is also the most effective when you're not sleep-deprived, so the more
rested you are the quicker you'll recover. You can find 33 secrets for a good
night's sleep here. Insufficient exercise. Regular exercise is a crucial
strategy for increasing your resistance to illness. There is evidence that
regular, moderate exercise can reduce your risk for respiratory illness by
boosting your immune system. In fact, one study8 found that people who exercised
regularly (five or more days a week) cut their risk of having a cold by close to
50 percent. And, in the event they did catch a cold, their symptoms were much
less severe than among those who did not exercise.
Exercise likely cuts your risk of
colds so significantly because it triggers a rise in immune system cells that
can attack any potential invaders. Each time you exercise you can benefit from
this boost to your immune system. Ideally, establish a regular fitness program,
such as Peak Fitness, now, to help you ward off colds and other illness.
Exercise can also help boost your immune system acutely, by increasing your body
temperature. This helps kill off invading pathogens, similarly to the fever your
body produces when sick. Using ineffective strategies to address emotional
stressors. Emotional stressors can also predispose you to an infection while
making cold symptoms worse. Finding ways to manage daily stress as well as your
reactions to circumstances beyond your control will contribute to a strong and
resilient immune system. Effective strategies include a variety of energy
psychology tools, such as the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT).
Zinc – Another Trusted Cold-Fighter
A Cochrane Database Review of the
medical research on zinc found that when taken within one day of the first
symptoms, zinc can cut down the time you have a cold by about 24 hours. The
review included 15 randomized control trials, consisting of 1,360 participants
of all age groups. Zinc was also found to greatly reduce the severity of
symptoms.
The review stopped short of
recommending any specific dose of zinc, citing the need for further studies to
establish optimal formulations and durations of treatment. However, some of the
studies showed the beneficial qualities of zinc in fighting the common cold used
between 50 and 65 mg a day. The people taking lozenges were more likely to
experience adverse effects than those taking syrup, including a bad taste in
their mouth and nausea.
Zinc was not recommended for anyone
with an underlying health condition, like lowered immune function, asthma or
chronic illness.
Also keep in mind that any time you
isolate one mineral and ingest it independently of the others, the potential
exists for imbalance, or in the worst case, overdose. Therefore, I wouldn't
currently recommend taking more than 50 mg a day, and I do not recommend taking
large doses of zinc on a daily basis for preventive purposes as you could easily
develop a copper imbalance that way. You can also activate the "Reverse Effect"
in which too much of a good nutrient can actually cause the opposite of what
it's supposed to do. So leave zinc for acute, short-term use only. Foods like
garlic, on the other hand, can safely be consumed regularly to maintain a robust
immune system.
“Let Food Be Thy Medicine”
As mentioned earlier, the first thing
you want to do when you feel yourself coming down with a cold or flu is to avoid
ALL sugars and processed foods. (I also recommend avoiding all artificial
sweeteners, as they can have a detrimental effect on immune function as well.)
Sugar is particularly damaging to your immune system -- which needs to be ramped
up, not suppressed, in order to combat an emerging infection. This includes
fructose from fruit juice, and all types of grains (as they rapidly break down
to sugar in your body).
Make sure
to drink plenty of pure water. Water is essential for the optimal
function of every system in your body and will help with nose stuffiness and
loosening secretions. You should drink enough water so that your urine is a
light, pale yellow. Ideally, you’ll want to address nutrition, sleep, exercise
and stress issues the moment you first feel yourself coming down with something.
This is when immune-enhancing strategies will be most effective. Foods that will
help strengthen your immune response include: Raw, grass-fed organic milk,
and/or high-quality whey protein Fermented foods such as raw kefir,
kimchee, miso, pickles, sauerkraut and other fermented vegetables Raw,
organic eggs from pastured chickens Grass-fed beef in small quantities of
a few ounces Coconuts and coconut oil Organic vegetables Garlic.
Ideally consumed raw and crushed just before eating Turmeric, oregano,
cinnamon, cloves Mushrooms, especially Reishi, Shiitake, and Maitake
Does Chicken Soup Really Work?
Short answer, yes, chicken soup can
be helpful against cold and flu symptoms. Chicken contains a natural amino acid
called cysteine, which can thin the mucus in your lungs and make it less sticky
so you can expel it more easily.
Processed, canned soups won't work as
well as the homemade version, however. For best results, make up a fresh batch
yourself (or ask a friend or family member to do so) and make the soup hot and
spicy with plenty of pepper. The spices will trigger a sudden release of watery
fluids in your mouth, throat, and lungs, which will help thin down the
respiratory mucus so it's easier to cough up and expel. Making it from scratch
is easy. Below, I demonstrate a simple recipe for making your own chicken soup
and stock
Put the chicken bones in a large
stock pan (use bones from organically-raised chicken) Cover the bones with water
Bring to a boil and lower the heat Simmer for about an hour or longer
Vitamin D – An Excellent Cold and Flu
Prevention Strategy
Vitamin D is an amazingly effective
antimicrobial agent, producing 200 to 300 different antimicrobial peptides in
your body that kill bacteria, viruses and fungi. So optimizing your levels will
not only help send a cold or flu virus packing, it can prevent them from
invading your body in the first place. Contrary to flu vaccines, this
recommendation has been steadily gaining scientific validation. In fact, there’s
compelling evidence suggesting cold and flu may actually be symptoms of vitamin
D deficiency.
Dr. John Cannell, founder of the
Vitamin D Council, was one of the first to introduce the idea that vitamin D
deficiency may actually be an underlying cause of influenza, which would help
explain its apparent benefits as a flu-fighter. His hypothesis was published in
the journal Epidemiology and Infection in 2006,9 which was followed up with
another study published in the Virology Journal in 2008.10 His hypothesis
received further support and confirmation when, in the following year, the
largest and most nationally representative study of its kind to date discovered
that people with the lowest blood vitamin D levels reported having significantly
more recent colds or cases of the flu.11
In another study, published in
2010,12 researchers investigated the effect of vitamin D on the incidence of
seasonal influenza A in schoolchildren. Over the course of a year, influenza A
occurred in just 10.8 percent of the children in the vitamin D group, compared
with 18.6 percent of the children in the placebo group. According to the
authors:
"This study suggests that vitamin D3
supplementation during the winter may reduce the incidence of influenza A,
especially in specific subgroups of schoolchildren."
Revised and Updated Recommendations
for Optimizing Your Vitamin D Levels
Research on vitamin D is moving
swiftly, so you’d be well advised to stay on top of the latest developments as
recommendations are refined and updated. I will cover the latest developments
here, so you may want to share this article with your peers. First, it’s
important to remember that sun exposure is the best way to optimize your vitamin
D levels as your body has built-in “fail-safe” mechanisms that prevent
detrimental side effects from occurring. Last year, I created a video to help
you determine if you can get enough vitamin D from sun exposure in your area at
different times of the year.
Based on additional information
received, I now believe that my previous position was too strict... The good
news is, you can likely get vitamin D under far less ideal conditions than
previously suggested.
The radiation from the sun that
reaches the earth's surface (and hence your body) is partially filtered out by
the atmosphere. I had previously stated that UVB rays will only penetrate the
atmosphere when the sun is above an angle of about 50° from the horizon, and
that when the sun is lower than 50°, the ozone layer will absorb vitamin
D-producing UVB-rays while allowing the longer, and more harmful, UVA-rays to
get through, which would defeat the purpose of spending time in the sun.
This recommendation is likely too
strict. According to experts in the field, you can likely get sufficient amounts
of UVB radiation when the sun is as low as 30 degrees above the horizon, or
whenever the temperature is warm enough to expose large amounts of skin.
I thank John Hochman, MSME, for
bringing this to my attention. According to Dr. Ola Engelsen with the Norwegian
Institute for Air Research, the creator of a calculator13 that takes a number of
factors into consideration give you an estimate of how many minutes of exposure
you need to produce the equivalent of 1,000 IU’s of vitamin D, the sun must be
more than 15 degrees above the horizon during cloudless conditions.
If You Take Vitamin D Supplements,
Remember to Take Vitamin K2
Second, based on the latest
investigations by Carole Baggerly, director of GrassrootsHealth, the average
adult dose required to reach healthy vitamin D levels is around 8,000 IU's of
vitamin D per day if you're taking an oral supplement. For children, many
experts agree they need about 35 IU's of vitamin D per pound of body weight.
Here, it’s important to remember that if you’re taking high dose vitamin D
supplements, you ALSO need to take vitamin K2.
The biological role of vitamin K2 is
to help move calcium into the proper areas in your body, such as your bones and
teeth. It also helps remove calcium from areas where it shouldn’t be, such as in
your arteries and soft tissues. Vitamin K2 deficiency is actually what produces
the symptoms of vitamin D toxicity, which includes inappropriate calcification
that can lead to hardening of your arteries. The reason for this is because when
you take vitamin D, your body creates more vitamin K2-dependent proteins that
move calcium around in your body. Without vitamin K2, those proteins remain
inactivated, so the benefits of those proteins remain unrealized.
So remember, if you take supplemental
vitamin D, you're creating an increased demand for K2. Together, these two
nutrients help strengthen your bones and improve your heart health.
While the ideal or optimal ratios
between vitamin D and vitamin K2 have yet to be elucidated, Dr. Kate
Rheaume-Bleue, author of Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox: How a Little Known
Vitamin Could Save Your Life, suggests that for every 1,000 IU's of vitamin D
you take, you may benefit from about 100 micrograms of K2, and perhaps as much
as 150-200 micrograms (mcg). So, if you take 8,000 IU's of vitamin D3 per day,
that means you'd need in the neighborhood of 800 to 1,000 micrograms (0.8 to 1
milligram/mg) of vitamin K2.
Lastly, remember that your vitamin D
requirements are highly individual, as your vitamin D status is dependent on
numerous factors, so while 8,000 IU’s of vitamin D3 per day may put you closer
to the ballpark of what most people likely need, it is impossible to make a
blanket recommendation that will cover everyone's needs. The only way to
determine your optimal dose is to get your blood tested. Ideally, you'll want to
maintain a vitamin D serum level of 50-70 ng/ml year-round. For an in-depth
explanation of everything you need to know before you get tested, please read my
latest updates in Test Values and Treatment for Vitamin D Deficiency.
Other Supplements that Send Pathogens
Packin'
There are a number of supplements
that can be beneficial for colds and influenza, but I believe they should be
used only as an adjunct to other healthy dietary and lifestyle measures
discussed in this article. Some of the more helpful options for cold and flu –
above and beyond vitamin D, garlic, and zinc – include: Vitamin C: A very potent
antioxidant; use a natural form such as acerola, which contains associated
micronutrients. A tea made from a combination of elderflower, yarrow,
boneset, linden, peppermint and ginger: Drink it hot and often for combating a
cold or flu. It causes you to sweat, which is helpful for eradicating a virus
from your system Oregano Oil: The higher the carvacrol concentration, the more
effective it is. Carvacrol is the most active antimicrobial agent in oregano oil
Medicinal mushrooms, such as shiitake, reishi, and turkey tail Propolis: A
bee resin and one of the most broad-spectrum antimicrobial compounds in the
world; propolis is also the richest source of caffeic acid and apigenin, two
very important compounds that aid in immune response Olive leaf extract:
Ancient Egyptians and Mediterranean cultures used it for a variety of
health-promoting uses and it is widely known as a natural, non-toxic immune
system builder
So please, carefully review the
evidence against flu vaccines, and consider using all-natural immune boosting
lifestyle strategies as your first line of defense against colds and flu. As you
can see, there are many alternatives available, from optimizing your vitamin D
levels and taking zinc at the first sign of infection, to incorporating immune
boosting foods like garlic into your daily diet.
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