SoMoMom's Food Allergy information has moved toInside your body there is an amazing protection mechanism called the immune system. It is designed to defend you against millions of bacteria, microbes, viruses, toxins and parasites that would love to invade your body.
Your immune system did not face as many problems as it does in this day and age. Now it has to deal with pollution, radiation, poisons, toxins, pesticides, herbicides and chemicals, in the air that we breathe, the food that we eat and the water that we drink. The immune system is fighting a huge battle, just trying to cope with all these attacks that are happening every day. Luckily for us, these cells can be generated very quickly. So with the correct nutrition, it does not take the immune system much time, to get back up to full strength.
Your blood is composed mainly of red and white cells. Red cells carry oxygen and nutrition to all parts of the body while white cells are defenders and scavengers of your body. During an infection, white cells are immediately called upon to fight the infection and clean up afterwards. These billions of cells work very hard and consequently they have quite a short lifespan, usually, only a few days.
The cells involved in your immune system, have what is called “cellular communication”. The cells essentially ask each other if they are OK. If one says it is unwell, the others will all help it to heal. If it is beyond help, the other cells will exterminate it and then eliminate it completely from the body.
When you have a vaccination, your immune system is given a copy of a specific disease, so that if the system comes across the disease again, the memory cells in the immune system, will know exactly what action to take, likewise, if you have had a disease before, they know what to do in the event of reinvasion.
There is a natural slow decline in the efficiency of the body’s immune system, which partly comes with age; you tend to absorb some nutrients less efficiently.
"The problem in our modern world is that we're under stress for long periods of time," said David L. Woodland, an immunologist at the Trudeau Institute, a nonprofit research center in Saranac Lake, N.Y.