How To prevent Flu

Since there are no easy cures for flu, a proactive approach is to make your whole life healthier so your immune system is well prepared to prevent any flu attack.

The other way on how to prevent flu is to get the flu shot. It may not be natural, but it works better than anything else.

Nevertheless there are some general tips on how you can prevent flu.

#1 Wash Your Hands

Most flu viruses are spread by direct contact. So wash your hands often. If no sink is available, rub your hands together very hard for a minute or so. Or rub an alcohol-based hand sanitizer onto your hands.

#2 Don’t Cover Your Sneezes and Coughs With Your Hands

Because germs and viruses cling to your bare hands, muffling coughs and sneezes with your hands results in passing along your germs to others. Use a tissue and throw it away. If you don’t have a tissue, turn your head away from people near.

#3 Don’t Touch Your Face

Cold and flu viruses enter your body through the eyes, nose, or mouth. That is how children pass colds on to their parents.

#4 Drink Plenty of Fluids

Water flushes your system, washing out the poisons as it rehydrates you.

#5 Take a Sauna

In one 1989 study, it was found that people who steamed twice a week got half as many colds as those who didn’t. The reason is not clear but it could be that in a sauna, it is too hot for flu viruses to survive.

#6 Get Fresh Air

Fresh air is important, especially during cold weather when people stay indoors with more germs are circulating in crowded rooms.

#7 Do Aerobic Exercise

Aerobic exercise speeds up the heart to pump larger quantities of blood; makes you breathe faster to help transfer oxygen from your lungs to your blood; and makes you sweat once your body heats up. These exercises help increase the body’s natural virus-killing cells.

#8 Eat Healthy and Nutritious Foods

Foods like dark green, red, and yellow vegetables and fruits contain phytochemicals which can improve your overall health and help to prevent flu..

#9 Eat Yogurt

Some studies have shown that eating a daily cup of low-fat yogurt can help to prevent flu by 25 percent. Researchers think the beneficial bacteria in yogurt may stimulate production of immune system substances that fight disease.

#101 Relax

If you can teach yourself to relax, you can activate your immune system on demand. There’s evidence that when you put your relaxation skills into action, your interleukins — leaders in the immune system response against cold and flu viruses — increase in the bloodstream.

#10 Don’t Smoke

Statistics show that heavy smokers get more severe colds and more frequent ones.

Even being around smoke profoundly zaps the immune system. Smoke dries out your nasal passages and paralyzes cilia. These are the delicate hairs that line the mucous membranes in your nose and lungs, and with their wavy movements, sweep cold and flu viruses out of the nasal passages. Experts contend that one cigarette can paralyze cilia for as long as 30 to 40 minutes.

#12 Cut Alcohol Consumption

Heavy alcohol use suppresses the immune system in a variety of ways. Heavier drinkers are more prone to initial infections as well as secondary complications. Alcohol also dehydrates the body — it actually takes more fluids from your system than it puts in.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 3rd, 2009 at 10:15 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.