Immune Resilience

A sweeping look at the complexity of our immune system, with a natural, science-based program to help protect against viruses and other pathogens.

Some people can fight off infections relatively easily, with minor symptoms, while others suffer severely. But these outcomes and our immune responses against them aren t fixed; we can build immune resilience.

But how? The answer goes beyond popping vitamin C and zinc during flu season. As clinical nutritionist Romilly Hodges reveals, our immune system is intricate and multifaceted, and powerfully impacted by what we eat, as well as by our lifestyle routines.

Immune Resilience offers a fascinating tour of the incredible ways our bodies protect us against disease, with assessments throughout to help the reader identify their weak areas. Then it outlines a personalized, step-by-step program blending defense-building foods with lifestyle strategies, including important advice on movement, sleep, and stress-relief. This book explains:

the connection between sleep and immune memory
how you can harness the power of gentle fasting
why good germs increase immunity and decrease allergies and asthma
how to prepare nutrient-packed meals, with recipes
**** what kind of exercise boosts immunity, and more

With easy-to-reference guidelines for specific infections and a curated guide to the supplements you really need, this essential book helps you put your health in your own hands.

Autorentext

Romilly Hodges, MS, CNS, CDN

Leseprobe

Chapter 1

 

Hidden Enemies Around Us

 

Humans have lived with infectious microbes since our very first beginnings and they have been, for most of our history, one of humanity's biggest preoccupations. Fortunately for us, modern science has had many shining successes against infections. To understand these successes, as well as our ongoing vulnerabilities to pathogens, we need to look at where we've come from, and where we are now.

 

Louis Pasteur's "germ theory," which originated in the 1870s, marked the dawn of our modern-day approach to microbes by illuminating for the first time the immense landscape of microscopic infectious pathogens that were behind the most problematic diseases of the time. It was a turning point after which medics and scientists began to develop and use hygiene principles and antimicrobial agents to prevent infection. Improvements in sanitation, water treatment, and pasteurization that were subsequently adopted have saved millions of lives and are still vital today. But despite these advances, the leading causes of death in the early 1900s remained infectious diseases, especially pneumonia and tuberculosis. Smallpox, cholera, diphtheria, and polio were also widespread. Average life span was just forty to fifty years in part because childhood infections were frequently fatal, and infections we now consider minor could lead to sepsis and death.

 

Against this background, it's no wonder that the first licensed vaccines in 1914, and first widely distributed antibiotics in 1928, were hailed as miracles of modern medicine. The decades that followed World War II were a golden age for vaccine and antibiotic development, culminating in the complete eradication of smallpox, near-eradication of polio, and the ability for people to live their lives unencumbered by the fear of catching diseases that could cause paralysis, brain damage, blindness, and death. The control over infectious diseases was such that their cumulative mortality rates dropped from 797 to just 36 per 100,000 people per year between 1900 and 1980. This allowed scientific and medical attention to shift to what then seemed like more pressing concerns: chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and cancer.

 

Aside from the tremendous difference that these medical advances made, what's also remarkable about this is that it is only relatively recently in human history, and only really in industrialized countries, that infectious diseases have taken a back seat. Of course, COVID-19 thrust infections back to the forefront, highlighting the potential for new pathogens to emerge and wreak havoc across the world. Prior to that, though, it's arguably in part down to sheer luck that prior outbreaks such as SARS and Ebola never completely took hold on our shores. And these emerging diseases are not the only reason for growing concern and interest in new antimicrobial solutions. There's increasing recognition that some pathogens can contribute to chronic symptoms and the chronic diseases that we normally consider separate from infectious ones. The scientific community is also sounding alarm bells over the ever-growing incidence of antimicrobial resistance. COVID-19 dramatically changed the collective concern around infectious diseases. But the reality is that protecting ourselves against infectious disease has always been important. The current world of infectious, disease-causing microbes is still quite vast.

 

Today's Infectious Microbes

 

The primary types of infection-causing microbes are bacteria, viruses, parasites, and fungi.

 

Bacteria

 

Bacteria are independently living, single-celled organisms that are generally large enough to be identified under a light microscope. Most bacterial infections can be successfully treated with antibiotics. Common types of bacteria that can cause human infection when they proliferate are staphylococci and streptococci. Normally, these infections are localized at a particular site in the body, such as the throat, gums, sinuses, ears, lungs, skin, urinary tract, digestive tract, or genitals, but if they infect the blood, it causes a widespread infection called septicemia. Rarely, bacteria can cross into the central nervous system and cause meningitis. Other types of bacteria include borrelia burgdorferi, which causes Lyme disease. Harmful bacteria are also the cause of most instances of food poisoning.

 

Viruses

 

Viruses are much smaller than bacteria and operate quite differently. They cannot exist independently since they don't have their own cellular structure; instead, they are tiny fragments of genetic code that must insert themselves into the living cells of humans or other organisms (including bacteria) in order to survive. They can infect any part of the body. Viruses cannot be treated with antibiotics, and there are relatively few antiviral drugs available. Common types of human-infecting viruses are flu viruses (influenzae), cold viruses (such as adenoviruses or coronaviruses), varicella zoster virus, which causes chicken pox and shingles, herpes simplex virus, Epstein-Barr virus, which causes mononucleosis, and cytomegalovirus. New viral strains have emerged as potential, serious threats in recent years, including severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2, the latter virus the cause of COVID-19), Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS), Ebola, West Nile virus, and Zika virus.

 

Fungi

 

Fungi can exist as simple celled organisms or branching structures made up of several cells. Fungal infections can occur at any location of the body and can usually be treated with antifungal medications. Fungal infections are usually relatively mild, such as skin ringworm, athlete's foot, oral thrush, or vaginal candidiasis. However, rarely, and particularly in people whose immune systems are compromised, fungal infections can compromise essential organ functions and become life-threatening. Valley Fever, caused by Coccidioides fungi, is one example of this.

 

Parasites

 

Most parasitic infections affect people living in tropical and subtropical countries, but several can also occur in Europe, North America, and other parts of the world. Parasites range in size from those visible only with a microscope to those that are visible even to the naked eye. In…