In the world of Covid-19, how do you boost your immune system?

The strength of your immune system plays an important role in determining how your body reacts to a virus. A resilient immune system has the ability to attack foreign substances (such as a virus) with minimal tissue damage. This may help prevent infection or it may reduce the severity of symptoms experienced if infected.

Here are some lifestyle changes that you can make today to help boost your immune system during these uncertain times:

1. Get enough sleep

While you are sleeping, your body activates and primes the immune system. This is one of the most important strategies to build your overall immune resilience to infections. An increase in sleep actually increases the ability of our white blood cells to fight viral infections more efficiently.

Having a routine before bedtime is extremely helpful. Taking a bath, reading a book, or doing breathing exercises are really good ways to remind your body to slow down, to relax, and to prepare for sleep.

2. Eat a rainbow of fruits and vegetables

Fruits and vegetables are nutrient dense in flavonoids, vitamins and minerals. When the body encounters a virus, inflammation is produced, and your antioxidant system has to calm this down. For this we need to eat foods high in sulfur and flavonoids. Basically colorful foods and sulphur smelling foods is one of the key things. High flavonoid foods like blueberries, pomegranate, cherries, raspberries, blueberries etc. and high sluphur containing foods like garlic, leeks, onions, shallots, chives create flavonoids and precursors for us to make our antioxidant system work efficiently.

Different colors provide different antioxidant power to mop up free radicals. Eat a variety of fruits and vegetables of different colors every single day.

3. Add spices to your food

There are many herbs and spices with powerful antiviral activity. These include coconut oil, garlic, sage, ginger, green tea, apple cider vinegar, oregano, thyme.

4. Cut down on sugar!

Keeping blood sugar levels healthy has been shown to improve immune system activity. Sugar is extremely inflammatory and suppresses your immune system. High blood sugar unleashes destructive molecules that interfere with the body's natural infection-control defenses.

Keep your sugar intake to a minimum, by avoiding foods that have high amounts of concentrated sugar such as baked goods, concentrated fruit juices, candy bars, sweets.

5. Exercise regularly

Regular physical activity helps raises the level of antibodies and white blood cells. white blood cells are part of the immune system that help fight infection.

If you don’t have access to a gym there are plenty of videos online where you can do at home workouts, or you can walk or run outside.

6. Reduce and keep stress low:

Learning how to manage our stress in a healthy way is one of the most important ways we can strengthen our immune system and build emotional and cellular resilience.

Some the most effective ways of managing stress are meditation, practicing gratitude and exercise. In addition to boosting immunity, exercise also changes your brain function and can decrease stress.