• Canned chick peas and black beans. Heat them with garlic and turmeric and serve with brown rice and salsa for a fast, fibre-filled, nutrient-dense meal.
• Tomato based pasta sauce. Heat and mix the sauce with cooked onions and garlic to add more anti-oxidants to a meal.
• Frozen vegetables. Use as side dishes or to add quick colour, flavor and nutrients to soups, pilafs, stir-fries and pasta dishes.
• Frozen fruits. Snack on unsweetened blueberries by the handful. Use any kind of fruit that appeals in smoothies and on yoghurt or cereal.
• Canned soups. Stock up on fibre-filled lentil, vegetable, minestrone, split pea and black bean varieties. Research shows that eating soup before meals can reduce kiljoule intake by one-third.
• Frozen veggie burgers. They are low in fat and perfect topped with tomato sauce for its flavonoids and lycopene (and, of course, its taste!)
• Canned seafood. Use tuna, salmon, clams, sardines and oysters in salads, soups, casseroles and omelettes for a dose of omega-3s and minerals.
• 100 per cent wholemeal pita pockets. Keep them in the freezer, then thaw, toast and stuff for sandwiches. Or cut into triangles to replace high-fat crackers.
• Quinoa. Although classified as a grain, this yummy nutty-flavoured food is really the dried, protein-filled seed of a leafy plant. Use in place of rice.
• Canned low-fat chicken stock. Perfect for whipping up nourishing vegetable soups (add frozen vegetables) or as a flavouring base for pilafs.
• Bottled condiments. Use liberal amounts of salsa, capers, olives, anchovies, crushed garlic and roasted red capsicum – they’re inherently nutrient-rich.
• Dried herbal soup ingredients. Drinking a traditional herbal soup once a while can replenish ones inner strength and vitality.
• Prunes and dates. High in fibre and nutrients, eat them before meals or when you are hungry. Perfect for losing weight, avoid constipation and clearing the bowels quickly.

Most vitamins and minerals are well retained in frozen vegetables.

I believe that variety is the spice of life and the key to enjoyable, healthy eating. So it’s wise to fill your kitchen with a wide array of good healthy foods and follow my creative kitchen tips I’m about to share:

• Replace fat with a little flavor. Add some palate-pleasing seasonings to ensure that you won’t miss the fat. Cover a garden salad with a low-fat yoghurt dressing flavoured with Tabasco sauce, vinegar, honey, garlic and onions and you’ll never miss the mayonnaise.
• Light a Fire. Barbecuing brings out maximum flavor in vegetables. Instead of having hamburgers, sausage, or steak at your next barbecue, cook fish and a medley of vegetables, such as squash, eggplant and onions. Sprinkle a light coating of oil on both the vegetables and the fish beforehand so they won’t stick.
• Colour up the salads. Chop fresh carrots, green onions, celery and red or yellow capsicum. Add to store-bought salsa and mix in lemon, lime, cumin or garlic for a chunky, tangy dressing. Just serve over your usual green salad.
• Be cool. Add mint or coriander to foods for an interesting edge.
• Remember, opposites attract. Surprising combinations such as diced fruit and berries in green salads, scallops with rosemary, or peaches with capsicum, will tickle the taste buds.
• Be the Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo in your kitchen. Let your plate be your canvas. Choose foods for their colour, arrange them artfully, use garnishes for extra visual appeal and pile the plates high – food should look satisfying, and you can afford to get generous portions of these foods.

Being creative can keep you healthy!

First and foremost, you have come to the right place. Always keep yourself informed and updated about H1N1. Reading health websites and hearing the news will keep yourself updated and is important during a pandemic.

When you hear about the news, you would want to follow public health advice regarding school closures, avoiding crowds in certain places and other social distancing measures and preventive actions, especially if the outbreak reaches your city or town.

Basically, such an influenza is thought to spread mainly from person-to-person through coughing or sneezing of infected people. Taking preventive measures helps in any influenza outbreak – so travel as needed or go for social gatherings only if necessary. If you are dealing with stress and anxiety, find other ways to deal with it until the pandemic is over – simple sacrifices can save lives, not only yourself but others.

Wear a face mask during a pandemic.

I would also suggest to stay healthy daily by doing the following:

• If you are going to cough or sneeze, try to cover your nose and mouth with a tissue. Dispose the tissue safely in the trash after using it.
• Always wash your hands often with anti-bacterial soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Some alcohol-based hand cleaners are also effective.
• Avoid touching your own eyes, nose or mouth. Virus and germs spread easily when in contact with those areas.
• If you fall sick, stay home or quarantine yourself. Health officials recommend that you stay home from work or school and limit contact with others to fight the outbreak, so follow the orders of your government.
• Take proper healthy food  like fruits and vegetables. Stock some Vitamin C
  at home and take them daily. You want to stay healthy in case if you do get the disease, the outcome would be less severe and therefore, curable.

Fifteen years ago, most scientists would have laughed at the very idea. Back then, everyone thought of the immune system as the body’s formidable but independent fighting force, impervious to any influence short of intense exposure to radiation or lethal, antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The notion that seemingly minor changes in what you eat, how you spend your leisure time, or the amount of sleep you get each night might alter the complex dynamics of the immune system seemed ludicrous.

Having seen in this chapter just how complicated and finely tuned our immune systems are, almost anyone would be similarly skeptical. How could your actions possibly affect the invisible world of T-cells, B-cells, antibodies and phagocytes, to name only a few of the major players that make up the immune system? Even as research immunologists have been mapping the multilayered terrain of the body’s vital and mysterious guardian band, scientists approaching the immune system from a different angle have been making practical observations about things that help and hinder it in its work.

Consuming the right food can boost immunity

Steering clear of factors that dampen immunity is only half of the equation. It’s not enough to avoid the wrong foods, you need to eat the right foods. Similarly, staying on an even keel emotionally may protect you from immune-suppression linked to depression, but seeking out positive experiences and cultivating your capacity for joy might give your disease-fighting mechanisms a special added boost.

Strengthening the immune system with a new attitude
Taking proactive measures to strengthen your immune system might sound daunting, given how many other tasks we’re already trying to balance in today’s revved-up society. In reality, though, the new findings about lifestyle and the robustness of your immune system are quite encouraging: they make clear that little things really do mean a lot, that it’s definitely worthwhile to take that brisk walk around the block, eat one more scoop of nutrient-rich fruit salad and carve out extra time for relaxing with people who make you most happy.

Fortunately, the body is wonderfully regenerative. By making and sticking with a few simple changes, you can coax your internal army of white blood cells into fighting shape in just a few months.

One of the many ironies of medical progress is that as knowledge of the body’s intricate workings grows more detailed, evidence that individuals can improve their health by doing simple, low-tech things such as exercising becomes more and more compelling. The complex but startlingly responsive immune system illustrates that this paradox perfectly.

Can strengthening the immune system turn back the clock?
Most people over 70 have weakened immune function. Some, however are blessed with the robust immune systems and the low illness rates of young adults. These fortunate few are also likely to surpass average life expectancy. Their gift is partly the result of lucky genes, but avoiding things that damage immunity in the elderly – in particular, nutrient deficiencies – plays a role as well. So the answer the question is yes.

• Water quenches thirst. The awareness of thirst diminishes with age, so older people need to mindful of drinking enough every day.
• It brings moisture and nutrients to you organs.
• It has anti-aging qualities.
• It flushes out impurities, detoxifying your body.
• It beautifies your skin and smoothes out wrinkles.
• It improves brain function.
• It lubricates joints.
• It regulates body temperature.
• It increases energy.
• It releases stress, because dehydration is one of the biggest stressors for the body. Nothing functions well without water’s soothing, renewing qualities.
• It helps reduce weight gain when drunk half an hour before a meal by leading to an earlier feeling of fullness.
• It prevents kidney stones.
• Natural spring water contains essential minerals:
bicarbonates (which regulate acidity), calcium (Strengthens bones), chloride (regulates acidity), fluoride (protects your teeth from cavities), iron (prevents anemia), magnesium (essential for your heart, bones, and temperature regulation), potassium (important for heart and muscles), sodium (balance water distribution), and zinc (help bones, immunity, wound healing, and diabetes control). These minerals can be picked up by the water as it travels through different soils and sediments. Therefore, water from different springs might have very different mineral contents. Nothing is good as a pure spring or deep (tested) well.

Fresh Water

Fresh food includes all produce (fruit and vegetables), nuts, grains, legumes (beans, lentils, peas, garbanzos), and what you prepare from them. Fermented and dried foods are close to fresh food because they have undergone very little processing. Fermentation actually makes them healthier and more easily digestible, so sauerkraut and miso are naturally enriched with vitamins; our ancestors survived on them in bitter winters when no fresh produce was available. Freezing is an acceptable – but no perfect – modern way of preserving some freshness. Microwaving destroys too many phytonutrients; thaw and reheat in a lidded pot.

Why is fresh, organic food more healthful than processed, microwaved, fortified, enriched, canned, old, rancid, stale, milled food? Whole organic food contains more life-giving phytonutrients than produce that is grown conventionally. Phytonutrients are those special chemicals built up in the plant from water, soil, and sunlight. At one time, researchers thought they were not important for health. Now we are linking the diseases called “civilized” to the absence of  phytonutrients in the Standard American Diet (“SAD”): obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, heart disease, arthritis, depression, cancer – the list is endless. Phytonutrients are anti-inflammatory, given to us as presents from the plant world – hundreds of them in a single plant. In fact, organic food contains about one-third more than conventional, mostly because the soil in conventional agriculture has been deadened and depleted by chemical fertilizers. The health benefits of phytonutrients go beyond vitamins and minerals, and to this day we certainly have not discovered all of them.

The benefits of phytonutrients are transferred to animals that eat them, eventually to our meats and poultry. Organic lamb, for instance, has a very high vitamin C content because lambs are usually thrown out on the pasture soon after birth. They don’t get extra feed or antibiotics and hormones. All summer, they feed on untreated meadows. That is why their meat brims with the goods of sun-drenched, natural pastures. Unfortunately, even most of our organic meats are not grass-fed but grain-fed. Grains are unnatural to cows. What we then eat is an animal that was not healthy to begin with. Interestingly, we usually don’t eat predators and scavengers (cats, dogs, hyenas, vultures) – they are too far removed from the original, health-giving phytonutrients. And if we eat them – like lobster and shrimp that are the scavengers of the ocean floor – they usually come with a warning not to eat them too frequently. Omnivores, like pigs, fall into the category between grass-eaters and predators, and some cultures shun their meat too.

In additional to phytonutrients, fresh, organic food is more healthful because:

• Fresh, organic food contains lower level of pesticides, herbicides, and in the case of meats and poultry, lower levels of hormones, antibiotics, and meat fresheners.
• Fresh, organic food contains all the ingredients that correspond to our genetic needs, handed down to us from our evolutionary ancestors.
• Organic, whole foods fuel mitochondria – those cell organs that act as the energy factories in your body. Phytonutrients feed directly into mitochondria, counteracting one of the most common complaints of our times: lack of energy.
• Your body recognizes fresh, organic food as food, whereas it does not recognize many modern adulterated or entirely artificial molecules.
• Fresh, organic food contains good fats, good carbohydrates, and balanced proteins, naturally, taking the “thinking” out of what to eat.
• Fresh, organic food slows down the rate at which the blood sugar levels rise and therefore reduces insulin production. Sugar from the original source – plant – enters your blood slower, since the sugar is only available after plant cell walls have been broken down. Refined sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, in contrast, are available within seconds, swamping your system and acting as a poison – with the long-term consequence of “civilized” diseases.
• Fresh, organic food is naturally full of fiber and therefore lowers cholesterol.
• You must chew fresh, organic food more thoroughly, increasing saliva production and triggering digestive juices adequately. By contrast, junk food can be gobbled down, leaving your stomach and bowel overwhelmed and burdened.
• Fresh, organic food leads to less calorie intake, because chewing and high fiber contents trigger earlier satiety, making you feel full longer. It satisfies your body’s needs for phytonutrients in ways that macaroni and cheese cannot.
• Fresh, organic foods increase the bulk of stool, so it passes through the bowel faster, normalizing constipation and diarrhea. They also bind toxins and remove them faster from your gut. You won’t need extra bran.
• Fresh, organic foods boost your immune strength, provide some natural antibiotics, and decrease inflammation. In fact, decreasing inflammation is the whole point because lower inflammation will reduce “civilized”, degenerative diseases including cancer.

Chocolate’s unhealthful quantities come from additives: sugar and high-fructose corn syrup, milk and milk products, and cheap flavorings. But an organic dark chocolate (containing at least 70 percent cocoa) that is dairy-free and sweetened lightly with cane or beet sugar is well worth the extra expense. Or buy baker’s chocolate. It’s quite bitter but has no nutritional spoilers and cheap. Use unsweetened cocoa for hot chocolate, and make it with soy milk and water. And in the future, look out for new products that will offer chocolate without added ingredients.

Current theory holds that cancer, heart disease, stroke and other ills of ageing result from damage to cells by free radicals, oxygen molecules that are unstable because they have an extra electrical charge, or electron. Usually, electrons come in pairs.

In small numbers, free radicals help to fight off infection. In large amounts, however, they may harm tissue and DNA in a process called oxidative stress. In order to ‘steal’ an electron, they make attack cell membranes, making a hole through which bacteria or viruses can enter. Once inside the cell, free radicals may attack chromosomes, rewriting or destroying the genetic information. If this damage goes unrepaired, healthy cells may turn cancerous and existing cancer cells may multiply even faster.

Ironically, most free radicals are generated by the body itself during ordinary metabolism. They are also produced by air pollution, radiation, pesticide residues and other negative factors in the environment. What does this have to do with nutrition? Plenty in fact. By studying large populations, scientists have learned that people who eat an ample share of fruit and vegetables experience less oxidative stress. It turns out that fruit and vegetables contain hundreds of substances called phytochemicals. If you don’t know how to pronounce word (fy-toe-chemicals), you’re not alone. As recently as 20 years ago, many of the phytochemicals hadn’t even been discovered and even nutritional gurus never mentioned them. Everyone assumed that all the body needed from food was fat, protein, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, trace elements and water.

Since then, a dizzying number of studies have demonstrated that these compounds play vital roles in maintaining health. Some phytochemicals reduce oxidative stress; others dampen inflammation, detoxify contaminants and pollutants, and activate enzymes that block the unbridled division of cells. Others make it easier for nutrients to pass through cells.

Can eating an apple a day actually keep the doctor away? It seems clear that it really can help. Studies reveal that the more phytochemicals you consume, the lower will be your risk of disease. Eating the minimum seven servings of fruit and vegetables each day, for example, can lower your risk of disease. So eating more will benefit you more.

Many guidelines recommend the daily consumption of a variety of foods from each of the five groups:

breads,
cereals,
pasta,
rice,
noodles (four serves);
vegetables,
legumes (five serves);
fruit (two serves);
milk,
yogurt,
cheese (two serves);
meat,
fish,
poultry,
eggs,
nuts,
legumes (one serve);
and water (at least eight glasses).

So with enough intake of fruits and vegetables, you can benefit from the remarkable disease-fighting powers of chemicals.

For example, hepatitis, a common and contagious illness caused by one of several different viruses – hepatitis A, B, C or E – infects the liver, sometimes resulting in severe disease that can progress to noncontagious cirrhosis or liver cancer. Some other cancers, such as cervical cancer and T-cell leukaemia, are also triggered by viruses.

The best way to increase your immunity is by receiving vaccines against common viruses you many encounter, such as flu, measles and hepatitis A and B.

Please see Adult Vaccinations to see when you need to get one.

Increase your immunity with vaccination.

Because eating too few of the right nutrients can weaken your body and allow germs and disease to gain a foothold, a good diet is the first and most important way to stay well. That’s plain old common sense. But it’s also been scientifically proved. Researchers now know that B-cells, T-cells, phagocytes and natural killer (NK) cells can’t do their best at quashing cancer cells and other dangerous invaders, such as viruses and bacteria, without strong backup from the vitamins, minerals, fibre and phytochemicals found in healthy foods.

The latest proof is a study by US researchers, which found that women of older ages (say from 60 to 80) with good eating habits had immune function that was just as sound as that of younger women aged 20 to 40. This confirmed what several earlier studies had already suggested – that while genetic and environmental factors may do their part to gradually chip away at immune function, much of the decline often seen with advancing age is probably highly preventable with simple good nutrition.

You’d be surprised at how many chronic health problems start small and snowball into something more serious mainly because of a bad diet. Nutrient deficiencies that stem from poor eating habits can dampen the immune response an open the door to illness. In a vicious cycle, being sick creates an increased need for immune-boosting foods.

The arsenal of health-protective compounds in food can enhance immune functioning in measurable ways – for example, by increasing the number of white blood cells when the body is most vulnerable to infection. If this fact carries a ring of ‘boring, rigid diet’, put your fears to rest. When it comes to eating, we’ve all had our fill of ‘no’ and ‘never’. Instead, this chapter is about choices. After reading up on the many flavor-packed foods with proven health –enhancing potential, you’ll see how easy it is to devise an immune-boosting diet you’ll love.

Food versus Supplements

Why bother with good-for-you foods when you can simply pop a pill? While supplements have their place, by far the easiest, least expensive and most effective way to heighten your body’s ability to fight disease is to eat a diet that is rich in immune-stimulating nutrients. These include vitamins and minerals as well as many other compounds – including ones that haven’t even been discovered yet.

One important discovery made by scientists investigating the disease fighting powers of foods is that their nutrients are absorbed better from food than from pills. It also turns out that foods work synergistically – in other words, their health benefits are greater when they are eaten together. For instance, tomatoes, chillies and garlic, the ingredients of the classic salsa, deliver more potent power to protect your health when they are eaten in combination than when they are eaten alone. This finding reinforces the notion that supplements can never replicate the benefits of a varied diet.

Another reason not to rely solely on supplements: research shows that you can get too much of certain immune boosters, including Vitamin E (an antioxidant), by taking supplements. An overload of these nutrients might actually suppress immunity, making you more vulnerable to illness instead of less.

Besides helping your body to fight infection, eating more immune-boosting foods will give you a number of other health advantages. The dietary habits that strengthen immunity also reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes. A diet based on plant foods, with moderate amounts of lean meat and low-fat dairy and small amounts of high-fat foods, is particularly effective in reducing the risk of cancer. For added health protection, always maintain a balance between kilojoule intake and physical activity.

A varied diet replete with fruit and vegetables is the overall goal, but you’ll want to take extra care to fill your plate with the following ‘superfoods’. These nutritional powerhouses are amazing sources of immune-boosting phytochemicals and should be at the top of your shopping list. If you haven’t been eating these foods up to now, don’t be discouraged. There’ll never be a better time for you to start reaping their benefits.