It is getting colder by the day, which means the cold and flu season approaching rapidly. People are stocking their medicine cabinets with vitamins, medicine, and other cold remedies. Hand washing is happening much more frequently, as is the use of hand sanitizers, and the avoidance of crowded spaces. We will examine some remedies that you may not have considered.

Vitamins and Dietary Supplements

Vitamins and other dietary supplements may not offer health benefits and may even cause harm to some people. Recent data has prompted people to conclude that vitamins are a waste of money unless you have a specific nutrient deficiency, medical condition,  or illness. The research seems to indicate that vitamins don’t make healthy people healthier.

An article sheds some light on the need to make sure you have a balanced diet with the right nutrients to fight infectious diseases like influenza.  Some key information in the article:

Vitamins and minerals are necessary to produce immune cells. If you do not consume enough vitamins and minerals, the immune cells you produce may be compromised, making it more difficult to respond to infections.

Obesity and diet play a key role in not getting sick.

Where to get Your Vitamins

Getting vitamins and minerals from food is the best way for your body to absorb them. Multivitamins are a good addition for many people’s health regime.  Always consult your doctor before changing your diet.  Some supplements can be toxic especially if taken in large doses.

Dr. Beck of the University of North Carolina performed the study of mice infected with the flu virus. He found that obese mice infected with the flu were more prone to die, as compared to lean mice. He is expanding his trials to test this result in lean and obese humans. Here is another reason to lose weight.

Popping a pill does not work as well as eating right.

We are now looking at expanding our diet to incorporate some of the foods high in vitamins and minerals that we previously ignored.

Nasal Sanitizers

Being near a person who coughs or sneezes can infect you with their cold. Recently several products have been released that help clean the nose and reduce the amount of bacteria in nostrils. These products include:

• Nozin Nasal Sanitizer
• GermBullet 

You can also wear a scarf or other anti-bacterial winter covering to achieve the same effect.

Sambucus, Natural Cold Care, Elderberry Extract

It is cold and flu season. We have been taken Sambucus for years and find it really helps to shorten the duration and intensity of a cold. We take it at the first sign of when we feel that something is coming on, a scratchy throat or slight headache.  This supplement contains black elderberry extract.

We’ve tried many other items from Airborne to Iscillococcinum to Chinese herbs. This product is also sold under the trade name Sambucol. It comes in versions for kids and in pill form. Amazon and Whole Foods sell this product.

NIH Medline has information on Sambucus and gives it a grade B for Influenza. As always, check with your doctor before you take any medicine.

Everyone knows about the major food groups, eating a balanced diet, and following USDA’s My Plate. Here are some healthy  food options that we have read about that help people avoid harmful chemicals.

Organic Food

Organic fruits and vegetables are an obvious option and our post concentrates on buying just the ones that have the most pesticide residue. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has found that even after you wash certain fruits and vegetables, they still contain much higher levels of pesticide residue than others.

Super cancer fighter vegetables per a Stanford Doctor include: soy, onions, broccoli, tomatoes and blueberries.

Organic Milk

Buy milk that is USDA organic to avoid hormones like bovine growth hormone (rbST or rBGH), antibiotics, pesticides, and other additives. Most industrialized nations and all 25 members of the EU have not approved rBGH because it can sicken cows. Organically raised cows are also given access to pasture.  Some believe that these benefits are not real because milk is tested for antibiotic and pesticide residue.  Others believe that these hormones produce milk with higher-than-normal levels of the insulin-like growth factor called IGF-1. Where is my milk from shows where your milk is from.  Did you know that skim, whole, reduced fat milk all have similar amounts of protein,  calcium, and vitamin D?

Processed meats like cold cuts, hot dogs, bacon, and sausages have lots of sodium and nitrates which may cause heart risks or cancer.  Buy nitrate free meats instead.

Organic Eggs

Organic Eggs have better flavor and the chickens laying them have been feed organic feed. Eating them is a good way to  help minimize risk of exposure to antibiotics, or synthetic hormones and pesticides while obtaining a healthy dose of nutrients.

Eggs need to be fully cooked properly to prevent food poisoning and salmonella contamination. Bacteria can exist inside an uncracked, uncooked whole egg. Avoid eating raw cookie dough with egg or making ice cream with egg or Caesar salad dressing with raw eggs. Cook eggs until the egg yolk and the egg white are firm. Cook egg custard used in eggnog, homemade ice cream, and quiches to at least 160 degrees. Bake egg meringues at 350 degrees for at least 15 minutes on the lower rack of your oven.

Organic Beef and Poultry

Avoid hormones and antibiotics in Beef and Poultry buy purchasing Organic products and grass fed beef. American livestock routinely get antibiotics to promote growth and to prevent possible illness. The problem is that this practice to germs to mutate and possibly generate antibiotic resistance in humans. In Denmark, they track livestock antibiotics and require a prescription before any is applied. Perhaps the United States should join this approach. The United States six times more antibiotics than Denmark to produce meat.

Saw this amusing sign at Whole Foods. Friends Don’t Let Friends eat meat with Drugs.

Stick to whole wheat bread and bread products.

Foods to avoid

• Avoid sugary foods especially ones with added high fructose corn syrup.  Diet soda does not help much as they are still empty calories. Avoid Protein Drinks with heavy metals.
• Avoid foods from cans and plastic containers that may have BPA.
• Do not watch TV during meals.
• Say no to foods with Trans fats.
• Avoid artificial colors and dyes
• Avoid anything with sharks fin in it

Avoid microwaved popcorn because to the inside of a microwave popcorn bag is usually coated with a perfluorinated chemical (PFC) called a fluorotelomer that can break down to form perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA). PFOA has been linked to cancer and birth defects in animals and preliminary epidemiological studies suggest that a pregnant woman’s exposure to PFOA may reduce her baby’s birth weight.

Get as much fiber in your diet as possible.  Fruits, vegetables, whole grains and legumes are some great sources.

Cooking your food Safely

• Cook on non teflon cookware
• Avoid microwaving food in plastic. Use ceramic or glass containers
• Cooked eggs and products with eggs, carefully
• Buy only high-quality ground beef
• Stick to sustainable seafood
• BBQ your food safely
• Go easy on proteins drinks
• Buy sustainable seafood

Be sure to watch the sunscreen and cosmetics you use.

Food Inc. was a sobering but enlightening movie.  It covers the commercialization of the food industry. There are many costs when putting value and convenience over nutrition and environmental impact.

Shown were slaughterhouses and factory farms where chickens grow too fast to walk properly. Cows eat feed pumped with toxic chemicals.  After watching this you want to become a vegetarian or at least stick to local, organic, and sustainable food.

The film shows Barbara Kowalcyk, who had lost her son to eating a hamburger with E. coli, and she’s now dedicated her life to trying to make the food system safer. But when they asked her what she eats, she told them she couldn’t tell them because she would be sued if she answered.  Scary.

We learned about Roundup pesticide resistant soybean seed and their legal tactics.  There are already weeds resistant to this pesticide. No surprise!

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