How can you help yourself?
HEALTHY immune systems run quite optimally on a normal balanced diet which is why the ‘immunity-boosting’ supplements that fill the shelves in health food shops are essentially a waste of money.
Even if it were possible to boost our defences significantly, this would be dangerous. It might risk our immune systems going rogue and attacking our bodies as happens in autoimmune diseases such as arthritis. However, we all want the best protection we can get right now, so what can you usefully do to assist your immune system and what is the scientific evidence to back it up?
Vitamin C
Studies on the common cold – which can be caused by other strains of coronavirus - suggest that vitamin C might shorten the infection. A 2017 report by the Cochrane Collaboration found that high-daily doses of 1,000mg vitamin C may shorten the length of a cold by 8 per cent. you’d have to eat 14 oranges to get that dose, so supplement pills are a better option.
Vitamin D
There’s fairly good evidence that taking a standard daily vitamin D supplement of 10 micrograms a day, as recommended by the NHS, may improve our protection against respiratory infections.
The vitamin helps to regulate our defences, according to a study by Professor Richard Mellanby, of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Inflammation Research, last year in the journal, Frontiers in Immunology. But often we don’t have enough of it. Our bodies make vitamin D via the action of sunlight on our skin and as we age we get less efficient at synthesising. We also cover up more in winter, when sunshine is at its weakest.
Exercise
Regular exercise such as cycling, brisk walking or gardening helps keep the immune system functioning well. White blood cells, known as T-cells, which kill viruses are produced by a gland in our chest called the thymus. This starts to shrink as early as our twenties. But exercise keeps it youthfully efficient, says a 2017 study in the journal Frontiers of Hormone Research.
Keep calm
Psychological and physical stress both raise the levels of the hormone cortisol in your blood. Studies performed by Janet Lord, Professor of Immune Cell Biology at the University of Birmingham, show that high cortisol suppresses the immune system and also causes the thymus gland to shrink.