There is nothing “happy” about the flu, but keeping healthy… that is another thing. That is really important to how happy you will feel, since it is easier to be optimistic and optimal when we are feeling good physically.
The negative side of that is when we try to ‘feel good’ at the cost of other equally important things. But right here I want to give you a tip on keeping well.
And more reason to love Grapefruits, too … or limeade and lemonade for that matter 🙂 It would be a good thing to pay attention to the ten foods to eat everyday, during this season when we want to keep our immunity strong. All good ways to get more Vitamin c and bioflavinoids into your diet.
Now here is a well traveled highway:
sniffle > cold > flu > pneumonia
Vitamin C can help stop this series before it starts.
The further you’ve gone down the path of sickness, the more “C” it will take to heal. The faster a locomotive is going, the more braking power it takes to stop it. Dr. Linus Pauling says to start taking more C at the very first sniffle. Good idea.
It is common for people to raise their eyebrows when many therapeutic claims are made for a single vitamin. “Vitamin C for colds, maybe. But pneumonia? C’mon!”
My central thesis may help explain it: The reason one vitamin can CURE so many conditions is that a deficiency of one vitamin can CAUSE many conditions. Disease is often the aggravated result of vitamin deficiency. If this seems to be too much emphasis on nutrition and not enough on microbes, we must remember that we live with viruses and bacteria all about us, all the time. Yet everyone is not sick all of the time. Differing nutritional status is at least as important a consideration as any other. A deficiency of any one vitamin can eventually cause death. Still, the aggressive use of vitamins to cure disease is seldom advocated.
Take vitamin C, for example. Because it is so good for so many illnesses, to the medical profession it is seen as TOO good for TOO MANY conditions. What a nice problem to have. This substance is too useful. Mmm. Can’t have that, now, can we!
Of course, doctors use the same antibiotic for dozens of different infectious diseases. Their argument is that there is cause (pathogenic bacteria) that must be stopped. Antibiotics kill bacteria like an A-bomb. Vitamin C stops bacteria in a different way: it works through the body’s immune system, like the French Resistance. You can probably win the war either way, but I’d rather avoid the negative effects of both the Bomb and the antibiotics.
A discussion of bacteria here is not entirely off-topic. Doctors (including a board-certified internist friend of mine who treated me, long ago) will give antibiotics for viral illnesses, such as pneumonia, to treat or prevent a secondary infection.
Robert F. Cathcart III, M.D., writes:
“Massive doses of ascorbate assist the immune system to kill bacteria within the body but also have the ability to kill bacteria by some mechanism, which does not seem to involve the immune system. These bacteria and L-forms of bacteria hide out in cells, especially when antibiotics are used, and explain some of the resistance acquired by bacteria against antibiotics. I have yet to see bacteria that can become resistant to massive doses of ascorbate in combination with first and second-generation antibiotics. Admittedly in a private practice, I do not see the most resistant bacteria, but this combination has been impressive and deserves to be tried against the most resistant bacteria. It may solve the impending problem of increasingly resistant bacteria.â€
COLDS AND FLU
Dr. Robert Cathcart says vitamin C works exceptionally well as an antiviral (and antibiotic) if you take enough. “Enough” is called “saturation,” and is indicated by loose bowels and/or intestinal gas. Try taking vitamin C until saturation is reached.
Additional suggestions:
20,000 IU of Vitamin A daily and a few grams of bioflavonoid supplements will also help. When sick, I drink lots of carrot juice and don’t need to take extra vitamin A. During illness, if you eat almost entirely fruits and vegetables, you won’t need the bioflavonoid supplement either.
The biggest difference you will find in treating influenza is that your saturation level of vitamin C will be higher (perhaps MUCH higher) than with the common cold. Dr. Linus Pauling has been saying this for decades, starting with his classic book, Vitamin C, The Common Cold and The Flu (Freeman, 1970). His more recent book, How To Live Longer and Feel Better, …is even better from Doctor Yourself
