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Banish Winter Bugs with
Feverfew Natural
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Seasonal sniffles, headaches and feeling generally under the
weather are usually part and parcel of winter.
Feverfew from Veganicity is a clever little bottle of
tincture which works to boost the immune system and ease
migraines, aching muscles and mild fevers.
The effects of colds and flu on the body can be
debilitating. A heightened temperature, the shivers,
feelings of nausea, migraines and even sickness and
diarrhoea are all common symptoms which can leave you
feeling totally washed out.
Veganicity's resident natural supplements expert, Martin
Betts, explains more:
"Every winter there is a sudden surge in the number of flu
cases which can be fatal for the very old and those with
additional health problems.
"If this winter follows the trend of recent years, we could
be set for another soar in deaths and hospitalisations
caused by the flu virus. Although there is no known cure for
these types of illnesses, giving nature a helping hand with
a natural remedy can help to boost your immunity and relieve
some of the pain and discomfort while your body gets to work
on fighting the virus."
Drug-free, Feverfew comes from a daisy-like plant which is
native to Europe, Australia and North America. The remedy is
thought to work by inhibiting the release of serotonin and
prostaglandins which can cause the blood vessels in the head
to become inflamed, leading to headaches and feeling
generally unwell.
Feverfew is available from:
fwww.veganicity.com,
Amazon.co.uk and
all good health stores priced at £6.95 for 50ml.
Ways to Live Longer
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Beyond diet and exercise, your thoughts, beliefs, and
behaviour are key in your quest to live longer.
The hard science of medicine gets all the credit for staving
off disease and adding on years. But practices that
strengthen your inner life — your mind, mood, and sense of
connection — count, too, often as much as any solution that
comes from a scalpel or prescription pad.
"There's good evidence that emotional, spiritual, and social
factors are all important for longevity," says Gary Small,
M.D., director of the Centre on Ageing at UCLA. Research
shows that these four strategies help the most.
1. Let The Sunshine
In
What we know: People who have a positive outlook when
they're young (measured by a personality test they took as
college students) end up living longer, report two recent
studies that followed participants for 30 and 40 years,
respectively. Even at age 50, just feeling upbeat about
getting older is linked, on average, to seven more years of
life.
What's the connection? "Negative emotions like hostility and
bitterness are bad for overall health and specifically for
the heart," says Stephen Post, Ph.D.
On the upside, women with sunny dispositions enjoy better
heart health — over a 10- to 13-year follow-up, they had far
less arterial narrowing than more dour women.
What you can do: Become an extrovert — join a community
group, try a new activity, strike up a conversation with a
stranger. Acting gregarious can make you feel more outgoing,
which is linked to a more positive mood.
2. Do Good Works
What we know: People who volunteer at two or more
organizations have a 44 percent lower death rate than those
who don't do any charitable work.
"That's comparable to exercising four times a week," Post
points out. Like working out, helping others seems to boost
antibodies. "We're establishing a biology of compassion
involving the immune system, brain, and hormones," says Post
What you can do: Sign up for any other group in which
you can be a mentor. "People tend to find greater meaning in
activities that pass the torch to a younger generation,"
says Post.
Maybe because their involvement is so rewarding, 87 percent
of mentors engage in at least one other volunteer activity —
and reap extra health benefits — versus just 40 percent of
volunteers who aren't mentors.
3. Say a Prayer
What we know: Regularly stepping through the doors of a
house of worship may slow your progress toward the pearly
gates by seven to 14 years, a recent survey showed. Partly,
that's due to the fact that faith communities provide
support, and religious people tend to avoid life-shortening
vices like smoking or drinking excessively.
But even when you factor out healthy habits, older people
who attend religious services once a week are 46 percent
less likely to die over six years than people who go to
services less often.
What you can do: Bolster public worship with private
spiritual practices like meditation and prayer. "The
combination of the two is linked to the best outcomes," says
Dr. Koenig. Even if you harbour doubts, join a congregation:
The spiritual wisdom you'll gain may change your outlook —
and boost your health.
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Oral Bacteria
Linked To
Risk Of Pneumonia
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Thousands of vulnerable people are being reminded
they should look after their oral health this winter
after scientists further linked oral bacteria to an
increased risk of pneumonia.
The study found changes in bacteria in the mouth
preceded the development of pneumonia, and lead
author Dr Samit Joshi of Yale University School of
Medicine concluded this process "suggests that
changes in oral bacteria play a role in the risk for
developing pneumonia".
It is thought pneumonia affects over 620,000 people
in the UK and claims the lives of around five per
cent of those who contract the disease.
Although further research is required to determine
the exact relationship between oral health and
pneumonia, it is not the first time the two diseases
have been linked.
Poor oral health has been associated with
respiratory diseases for a number of years, as
bacterial chest infections are thought to be caused
by breathing in fine droplets from the throat and
mouth into the lungs. This can cause infections,
such as pneumonia, or could worsen an existing
condition. Studies have even suggested a higher
mortality rate from pneumonia in people with higher
numbers of deep gum pockets.
The findings of the study present further evidence
that there's a significant health risk to the
elderly and the young, according to Chief Executive
of the British Dental Health Foundation, Dr Nigel
Carter.
Dr Carter said: "During the winter months we're all
susceptible to colds, coughs and chesty viruses due
to the drop in temperature. What people must
remember, particularly those highlighted as
vulnerable, is that prevention can be very basic.
"Systemic links between gum disease and overall
health have been well documented, and at this time
of year keeping up good oral health can really help
stave off illness.
"Simply brushing your teeth for two minutes twice a
day using a fluoride toothpaste, cleaning in between
teeth daily with interdental brushes or floss,
cutting down on how often you have sugary foods and
drinks and visiting the dentist regularly, as often
as they recommend will be a great starting point. If
you have swollen gums that bleed regularly when
brushing, bad breath, loose teeth or regular mouth
infections appear, it is likely you have gum
disease.
"If any of these symptoms persist, or signs of
pneumonia develop, visit your dentist and GP
immediately." |
What Causes Weight Gain?
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Whether or not your weight changes depends on a
simple rule:
Weight change = calories in - calories out
If you burn as many calories as you take in each
day, there's nothing left over for storage in fat
cells and weight remains the same. Eat more than you
burn, though, and you end up adding fat and pounds.
Many things influence what and when you eat and how
many calories you burn. These turn what seems to be
a straightforward pathway to excess weight into a
complex journey that may start very early in life.
Genes:
Some people are genetically predisposed to gain
weight more easily than others or to store fat
around the abdomen and chest. It's also possible
that humans have a genetic drive to eat more than
they need for the present in order to store energy
for future. This is called the thrifty gene
hypothesis.) It suggests that eating extra food
whenever possible helped early humans survive
feast-or-famine conditions. If such thrifty genes
still exist, they aren't doing us much good in an
environment in which food is constantly available.
Diet:
At the risk of stating the obvious, the
quantity of food in your diet has a strong impact on
weight. The composition of your diet, though, seems
to play little role in weight—a calorie is a
calorie, regardless of its source.
Physical activity:
The "calories burned" part of the weight-change
equation often gets short shrift. The more active
you are, the more calories you burn, which means
that less energy will be available for storage as
fat. Exercising more also reduces the chances of
developing heart disease, some types of cancer, and
other chronic diseases. In other words, physical
activity is a key element of weight control and
health.
What Leads to Weight Loss?
Just as weight gain is fundamentally caused by
eating more calories than you burn, the only way to
lose weight is to eat fewer calories than what you
burn. People can cut back on calories and lose
weight on almost any diet, as long as they stick to
it. The real challenge is finding a way to keep
weight off over the long run.
Low-fat weight loss strategies don't work for most
people. Low-fat
diets are routinely promoted as a path to good
health. But they haven't fulfilled their promise.
One reason is that many people have interpreted the
term "low-fat" to mean "It's OK to eat as much
low-fat food as you want." For most people, eating
less fat has meant eating more carbohydrates. To the
body, calories from carbohydrates are just as
effective for increasing weight as calories from
fat.
Low-carbohydrate, high-protein
strategies look promising in the short term. Another
increasingly common approach to weight loss is
eating more protein and less carbohydrate. Some of
these diets treat carbohydrates as if they are evil,
the root of all body fat and excess weight. That was
certainly true for the original Atkins diet, which
popularized the no-carb approach to dieting. And
there is some evidence that a low-carbohydrate diet
may help people lose weight more quickly than a
low-fat diet, although so far, that evidence is
short term.)
More recently, a two-year head-to-head trial
comparing different weight
loss strategies found
that low-carb, low-fat, and Mediterranean-style
diets worked equally well, and that there was no
speed advantage for one diet over another. Why, in
some studies, do high-protein, low-carb diets seem
to work more quickly than low-fat, high-carbohydrate
diets, at least in the short term? First, chicken,
beef, fish, beans, or other high-protein foods slow
the movement of food from the stomach to the
intestine. Slower stomach emptying means you feel
full for longer and get hungrier later. Second,
protein's gentle, steady effect on blood sugar
avoids the quick, steep rise in blood sugar and just
as quick hunger-bell-ringing fall that occurs after
eating a rapidly digested carbohydrate, like white
bread or baked potato. Third, the body uses more
energy to digest protein than it does to digest fat
or carbohydrate.
No one knows the long-term effects of eating little
or no carbohydrates. Equally worrisome is the
inclusion of unhealthy fats in some of these diets.
If you want to go the lower-carb route, try to
include some fruits, vegetables, and whole-grain
carbohydrates every day. They contain a host of
vitamins, minerals, and other phytonutrients that
are essential for good health and that you can't get
out of a supplement bottle. Choosing vegetable
sources of fat and protein may also lower your risk
of heart disease and type 2 diabetes.
Mediterranean-style diets may be effective. Eating
a so-called Mediterranean-style diet—one that
includes plenty of fruits and vegetables and that is
low in saturated fat but has a moderate amount of
unsaturated fat—offers another seemingly effective
alternative. In a controlled trial conducted by
researchers, 101 overweight men and women were
randomly assigned to a low-fat diet or a
Mediterranean-style diet. After 18 months,
volunteers on the low-fat diet had gained an average
of 6 pounds while those on the Mediterranean diet
lost 9 pounds. By the study's end only 20 percent of
those in the low-fat group were still following the
study diet, compared to more than half of those on
the Mediterranean-style diet.
Lessons from Losers
What was their secret?
They exercised. Registry
participants burn an average of 400 calories per day
in physical activity. That's the equivalent of about
60 to 75 minutes of brisk walking, or 35 to 40
minutes of jogging.
They ate fewer calories. On
average, registry volunteers consume about 1,400
calories a day. That's significantly less than the
calories consumed by the average person. This
doesn't mean, however, that you should aim for 1,400
calories a day. What's right for you is based on
your weight, height, and activity level.
They watched less television, limited fast food
intake, cut back on sugars and sweets, and ate more
fruits and vegetables.
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Medicinal Chef Creates Flu
Fighting Soup For The
Sniffle Season
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'Medicinal Cookery' by Dale Pinnock, the UK's first
Medicinal Chef, shows how, based on the most cutting
edge research, common ingredients can be used as
powerful medicines. This "Flu Fighting Soup' recipe
is a powerful example.
Dale's Flu Fighting Soup
1 red onion
1 green chilli
4 cloves of garlic
5 cm (2 inch) piece of ginger
2 medium sized sweet potatoes
1 punnet of shiitake mushrooms
2 Handfuls of goji berries
Vegetable stock
Method:
1.
Finely chop the onion, chillies, garlic, and
ginger. Add to a pan with a little olive oil, and a
pinch of crystal salt. Sauté on a mid to high heat
until the onion softens.
2.
Dice the sweet potato. Slice the shiitake
mushrooms. Add these two ingredients, plus the goji
berries to the onion, garlic, chilli, and ginger.
Stir well, then add enough vegetable stock to cover
all the ingredients. Simmer well, until the potato
is soft.
3.
At this stage, add the soup to a blender, and
blend into a vivid orange, spicy soup.
Medicinal Properties
Sweet Potato
A very rich source of the antioxidant compound beta
carotene. This is the plant form of vitamin A and
the chemical responsible for the vivid yellow flesh
of this delectable squash. Beta carotene is a subtle
but effective anti-inflammatory, which can help
reduce the severity of generic cold and flu
symptoms.
Sweet potatoes also contain a unique protein, called
a storage protein that actually acts as a food
source to the plant as it is growing. This protein
has been shown in some studies in China to increase
the production of white blood cells.
Shiitake Mushrooms
These have been used as a tonic for the immune
system for centuries. They have been highly revered
in traditional medicinal systems of the Orient. You
may well be wondering what is so special about a
simple mushroom. The truth is that certain types of
mushroom can deliver a stronger influence to the
immune system than any other substance, natural or
manmade.
Medicinal mushrooms, such as shiitake and maitake,
contain a group of very chemically complex sugars
called polysaccharides. Almost 40 years of
clinical study in Japan, USA, and China, has
revealed that these sugars are the magic bullets
that make medicinal mushrooms such powerful immune
boosters. It was once believed that these sugars
were absorbed by the body and then caused the immune
system to behave a certain way. However, it is now
becoming clear that these sugars exit the body via
the bowel completely untouched, yet the effect is
still being observed.
If you recall the description of the lymphatic
system above, you will remember that there are areas
of lymphatic tissue around the body performing
certain functions. In the walls of our gut, there
are patches of lymphatic tissue called Peyer's
patches. These can be likened to surveillance
stations in the gut, keeping an eye on what is going
on. These stations are staffed by a team of cells
called dendritic cells that constantly
monitor what is going on in the digestive tract, as
it is a convenient way for bugs and pathogens to
enter the body.
Dendritic cells are powerless to deal with any type
of invader or troublemaker themselves, rather, they
are able to effectively identify the type of
problem, then quickly and conveniently radio through
to the right emergency service that can deal with
the problem. It is believed that when the
polysaccharides
found in shiitake mushroom move past these patches
of tissue in the digestive tract, they cause the
dendritic cells to become excited and release
chemical messengers that rush through the whole body
and cause a sudden and drastic increase in the
production of white blood cells. This is because the
polysaccharides have a similar chemical shape to
sugars expressed by some common types of bacteria.
In essence, by eating these mushrooms we dupe the
body into thinking that it is under a more serious
bacterial attack. Obviously, as we aren't, this
response gives us more of an abundance of white
blood cells that are then able to move towards the
site of infection from colds, flu, etc, and deal
with the problem far quicker. Consumption of these
mushrooms on a regular basis is a great way to
enhance our daily defences, even when we are not
sick.
Garlic
This is the mother of all natural antivirals. The
strong smelly oils help to kill viruses and bacteria
in the upper digestive tract.
Ginger
Ginger is another one of those ingredients that we
naturally associate with cough and cold medicines.
Ginger has a wide and complex chemistry. Part of
this is a group of compounds called gingerols.
These essential oils, that give ginger its strong
zingy aroma and spicy flavour, are well known as
strong anti-inflammatories. Similar to a class of
drugs known as 'COX-2 Inhibitors', the oils found in
ginger help to interrupt the inflammatory process.
When inflammation becomes active, a series of
chemical reactions takes place, with the end result
being active inflammation. Gingerols simply get in
the way of this chain reaction and prevent it from
becoming fully active, thus naturally lowering
inflammation.
During a cold, we can experience an uncomfortable
bunged up feeling: a blocked nose and congested
sinuses. Many of us think that we are bunged up with
mucous (there is obviously some present), but most
of that feeling actually comes from inflammation of
the mucous membranes that line the nose and sinuses.
The anti-inflammatory action of ginger helps to
reduce the bunged up sensation.
The second benefit of ginger is that it stimulates
circulation, by relaxing the blood vessel walls and
widening the vessel. Enhancing circulation in this
manner helps to increase the rate at which white
blood vessels move around the body on their way to
the site of infection. It also increases the rate of
delivery of fresh oxygen and nutrients, and the
removal of waste products from all tissues,
including those that are infected.
Chilli
Chilli has been used medicinally by almost every
conceivable traditional medicinal system on planet
earth. Apart from its powerful stimulatory activity,
and painkilling properties, chilli can rapidly thin
out mucous, making it far easier to remove from the
body. This is especially useful when we are so
bunged up that we can't even blow our nose. I'm sure
many of you have experienced the classic runny nose
after eating a strong chilli. Consuming these as
much as possible during an infection can really help
to clear things up rapidly.
Goji Berries
These have been all over the media in recent years.
If you believe everything you read about them, they
would make you fly, walk on water, or have a libido
like Don Juan. In reality however, these berries are
really quite simple and other than being nutrient
dense, don't do a great deal. However, there is one
property that excites me. They contain
polysaccharides similar to those found in shiitake
mushrooms which also have been shown to up-regulate
white blood cell production.
Medicinal Cookery is published by 'Right Way', £7.99
in all good bookshops.
For more information
visit www.dalepinnock.com
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February 2012 