Boost immuntiy: 3 Immune-Boosters That Help Protect You From Colds and Flu

How many of you get the flu each and every year? Unless, you are one of the lucky few, Id bet that most of you answered I do to my question.

No one likes to get the flu. It makes you feel tired, achy, irritable and basically you just want to stay in bed.

So what can we do to protect ourselves from the flu this year? Well the NHSs recommendation is to get a flu jab. But what about the people who dont like to get shots or are allergic to hens eggs (the vaccine viruses are grown on eggs) or the people who just dont like to put chemicals in their bodies?

The good news is that there are herbs available that can help to prevent and treat the flu without having to resort to the flu jab. The even better news is that there are clinical trials supporting their efficacy.

Natural immune-booster you can use all year long
Echinacea is already the bestknown herbal product for colds and flu. But recently it has suffered from well-publicised problems involving poor product quality and ineffective clinical trials. These problems can really be traced back to the fact that the echinacea supplement market has become crowded, generic, and dominated by cheap, poor quality products.

So the key to the successful use of echinacea to prevent winter illnesses is to know which form to use and how to use it. The best form of this herb is the root, which is rich in phytochemicals known as alkylamides.

There is good clinical evidence for echinacea roots cold and flu preventative effects. In fact, several years ago, a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, demonstrated that a liquid extract of echinacea root significantly reduced the incidence of winter infections in medical students (MacIntosh A,  et al. Prevention of colds by two herbal formulas in a high stress population. Paper presented at the American Association of Naturopathic Pysicians Convention, Coeur dAlene, ID, 11/99).

Researchers found that med. students tend to be highly stressed and more susceptible to illness during the winter.

The echinacea liquid consisted of a flavoured blend of E. angustifolia and E. purpurea roots (in equal quantities) standardised to contain at least
1 mg/mL of alkylamides.

Over the course of the trial, researchers tested three dosage protocols on the volunteers: high (4 mL twice/day, corresponding to a daily dose of 4g of the echinacea root combination), followed by medium (3 mL twice/day) followed by low (2 mL twice/day). The control group had about a 10 per cent infection rate, but in the highest dose echinacea groups, only 2 to 3 per cent of the volunteers got sick.

The baseline preventative dose, which must be taken every day, should contain around 2.5g of echinacea root. When you feel a cold coming on, temporarily increase your dose to 7.5g to 10g per day to ward off the infection, then resume your
baseline dose.

The traditional Chinese way to fight the flu
In addition to echinacea, the traditional Chinese herb andrographis is emerging as another important immune-enhancing herb.  A recent review of many published studies found that andrographis was more effective than placebo in the treatment of respiratory tract infections (J Clin Pharm Ther 2004;29(1): 37-45). Andrographis helps prevent winter infections too.

In a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial, 107 healthy children received either andrographis extract tablets (200 mg per day of extract, standardised to 11.2 mg andrographolide) or placebo for three months during the winter cold and flu season. This dose corresponds to about 1g of the actual herb.

By the end of the third month, there was a significant decrease in the incidence of colds in the andrographis group compared to the placebo group:  The relative risk of catching a cold was 2.1 times lower for the andrographis group (Phytomedicine 1999 ;6(4): 217-23). This study was done in children, so the dose is smaller than it would be for adults.

Adults need to take the equivalent of around 3g per day as a preventative or about 6g per day when youre at risk from infections or when youre actually sick.

The Siberian secret to boosting your immune system
The final key flu-preventing herb is eleutherococcus, previously known as Siberian ginseng. In one double-blind study of 1,000 workers in a Siberian factory who received eleutherococcus daily for 30 days, researchers observed a 40 per cent reduction in lost work days and a 50 per cent reduction in general illness over a one year period (Farnsworth NR, et al. Siberian Ginseng (Eleutherococcus senticosus): Current Status as an Adaptogen. in Economic and Medicinal Plant Research, Volume 1. London: Academic Press, 1985, p 178).

Another placebo-controlled, double-blind German study demonstrated a strong enhancement of immune function, showing an increase in both natural killer cells and T-helper cells in healthy volunteers (Arzneim-Forsch 1987;37(10): 1,193-6). These studies all confirm that eleutherococcus can be considered a powerful, effective immune booster (Arzneim-Forsch 1987;37(10): 1,193-6).

The optimum flu-prevention dose of eleutherococcus is 3 to 4 g. One key point though, is to stop taking eleutherococcus if you do get sick, because high doses during an acute infection are thought to make the illness worse. Instead, you should up your andrographis or echinacea.

You do have to take these herbs year-round to get their full infection-fighting benefits, but that means theyll already be active and youll be protected well before flu season sets in. It also means youll be protected from colds at other times of the year like the ones that always seem to come on just as the weather finally gets nice in early summer.