Some vital tips to get through the cold winter unscathed by the flu virus while bolstering your health and enjoying your winter.
Here are some ways to prepare and prevent yourself from catching the flu this winter
Healthy diet
The old saying is, “Feed a cold and starve the flu”. However, a good healthy diet is powerful and effective to fight off the flu and cold. Brightly coloured fruits and vegetables are great sources of flavonoids, chemical compounds found in plants that can help the body fight inflammation and illness. Tea, coffee, dark chocolate, and certain grains, like buckwheat, are also good sources of flavonoids. Take your vitamins including vitamin C and lots of hot drinks and hot soups. Avoid cold drinks. Sprinkle raw garlic on your food, a powerful virus fighter, and cook your food with turmeric. Add ginger to your food and drink ginger tea. Chyavanprash works miraculously to ward off colds, sore throats, and flu.
Get warm doses of sunlight to activate straight shots of vitamin D to fight colds and viruses, along with calcium and vitamin D.
Walk and exercise
Exercise constructs your immune system and strengthens your fighting abilities. A walk outside builds your resistance and stimulates immune cells to wade off virus-infected cells. Doctors say that a few hours of moderate exercise spread across a week is enough to get your immune cells circulating optimally. Exercises can be walking, dancing, or gardening which is enough to undergo a big boost to your health.
Fresh air out in the open builds lung capacity and teaches the body how to resist diseases. Those who exercised five days per week were 43 percent less likely to be sick with an upper respiratory tract infection than those who exercised for less than one day a week. But even those who did a little bit of exercise were better off than those who did none.
COVID rules and precautions
While many people have stopped wearing masks in public indoor spaces, continuing to do so will help protect you against all sorts of viruses, not just COVID. This is particularly true if you have a more fragile immune system.
COVID-19 taught us the importance of hygiene. Washing hands, and keeping your distance when you have a cold will all help to keep all healthy this winter.
Rest and get good sleep
Good sleep helps heal your body and restore organs as well as regulates stress levels. When stress occurs chronically, it can reduce the body’s response to not only infections but also vaccines and can also increase inflammation, “all of which can increase our susceptibility to infection as well as other kinds of chronic diseases”, researchers tell us.
Too much exercise, though, can tax the body and temporarily suppress the immune system, increasing your risk of infections. There’s no simple formula for what constitutes too much exercise, the experts said, but if you’re suddenly feeling unwell or constantly tired, or if previously easy workouts are feeling hard, it might be a signal that you need to slow down.
Research has also shown that not getting enough sleep — or sleep of the right quality — can reduce the capability of your body to fight off infections. While not everyone frequires the same amount of sleep, the general guidance for adults is six to eight hours each night.
What is the flu?
Influenza (the flu) is a viral infection that causes symptoms like fever and chills, sneezing, coughing, and a sore throat.
The flu can be severe for some people, but if you are generally healthy you usually don’t need to see a doctor.
There is a vaccine available for the flu, and it’s recommended that everyone over the age of 6 months has a flu vaccination every year, usually done in the USA.
You can treat the symptoms of mild flu by resting and drinking plenty of water. Medicines are available to treat fever and aches.
