[Snowflake]

Hey everyone, the weather's getting worse and it's colder by the minute as winter season is about to come around where I live.

I would like to try to avoid catching a cold at all costs so I can avoid spending half my days sneezing and blowing my nose and focus on my goals instead.
Is there anything one can do to minimize the chances aside from eating healthy/ exercising/ getting good sleep?

[alecks]

use strong as fuck multivitamins.also try adaptogens like rhodiola rosea,maca,shizandra,ashwagandha etc.

less stress also.and get a decent jacket!

[Yul Brynner]

Minimal stress. And make sure you get enough sleep. I haven't had a cold in more than half a decade.

[Grit]

The common cold is a virus. Antibiotics do not affect it, so medications only help alleviate symptoms and don't actually cure it. Anti-bacterial soap doesn't affect it.

The virus is transmitted via air, so stay out of range of people's breath. if you girlfriend is sick, no macking. Tell her to go into hibernation till she recovers.

The virus is also transmitted via touching an infected surface and then touching your face.

#1 thing you can do. You hear that washing your hands is good prevention, right? Thats because vigrous scrubbing detaches the virus from your hands and it then runs down the drain (doesn't kill it). Try to be conscious every time you touch a public surface and swipe your hands on your pants. Change clothes frequently. Scrubbing the particles off your hands is the best way to avoid sickness.

Also, when you eat in a public place or get drinks, the bus boy towel absorbs bacteria and viruses. Use a clean napkin to wipe the table, and then clean your hands. Don't drink after anyone.

If you are anal, avoid high traffic areas like coffee shop lines where you know sick people will flock for hot drinks. Hold your breath when moving through library entrances, full elevators, etc.

[Cr33pin]

apparently Apple Cider Vinegar will stop you from getting any illness known to man kind......

[NYJ]

(09-26-2012 03:21 PM)Grit Wrote:  

The common cold is a virus. Antibiotics do not affect it, so medications only help alleviate symptoms and don't actually cure it. Anti-bacterial soap doesn't affect it.

The virus is transmitted via air, so stay out of range of people's breath. if you girlfriend is sick, no macking. Tell her to go into hibernation till she recovers.

The virus is also transmitted via touching an infected surface and then touching your face.

#1 thing you can do. You hear that washing your hands is good prevention, right? Thats because vigrous scrubbing detaches the virus from your hands and it then runs down the drain (doesn't kill it). Try to be conscious every time you touch a public surface and swipe your hands on your pants. Change clothes frequently. Scrubbing the particles off your hands is the best way to avoid sickness.

Also, when you eat in a public place or get drinks, the bus boy towel absorbs bacteria and viruses. Use a clean napkin to wipe the table, and then clean your hands. Don't drink after anyone.

If you are anal, avoid high traffic areas like coffee shop lines where you know sick people will flock for hot drinks. Hold your breath when moving through library entrances, full elevators, etc.

+1 at washing hands.

It kind of shocking and disgusting at the amount of people who don't do it. I always do and I don't think there is a coincidence that I can't remember the last time I was sick with a cold. Last time I was sick with anything in general was the first week of January of 2011. That was with a stomach virus.

Multivitamins(a good one, not centrum) and a good diet with plenty of water don't hurt either.

[8ball]

Get a bottle of COLDFX at Costco and whenever you feel like you might be getting something, pop two pills beofre going to sleep at night for a few nights in a row...you'll feel better and can avoid a visit to your doctor or any other medication. COLD FX makes your immune system fight it. You must have low immunity. Antibiotics should not be overdone and are useless when it comes to colds as mentioned by the previous posters. In addition, if you keep taking Antibiotics they will contribute to weakening your immune system...

[bacon]

vitamin d and the best source for that is sunlight

[kinjutsu]

Zinc caplets daily or as soon as your body starts to feel off start taking them. The ones that dissolve under your tongue.

[gringochileno]

Washing your hands is absolutely the #1 most effective thing you can do to keep from getting a cold. I'm in a hospital 5-6 days a week and touching sick patients all the time but I almost never get sick because we're required to wash our hands with soap and water or hand sanitizer before and after every patient contact. If you want to be super-anal about it, carry around a bottle of Purell. Avoiding touching your face, nose, and eyes is also very high-yield.

[markus]

+1 for apple cider vinegar, a good multivitamin, and zinc-elderberry lozenges
If you feel yourself coming down with a cold go to a Thai restaurant and get a big bowl of spicy tom yum soup and get a lot of sleep. It works for me every time.

[Snowflake]

Thanks a lot, tons of great info here

(09-26-2012 08:25 PM)kinjutsu Wrote:  

Zinc caplets daily or as soon as your body starts to feel off start taking them. The ones that dissolve under your tongue.

I'm taking zinc after I read the zinc thread, I picked up some zinc tablets labeled as "chewable", are they supposed to be dissolved under your tongue as well?

[JohnKreese]

As important as washing your hands is, I feel like being super-anal about it has downsides. Without exposure to some germs, your body isn't going to build up any resistance. I rarely get sick and am sure to expose myself to germs on a regular basis (I understand that billions of germs are floating around at all times) without running to wash my hands or use sanitizer every five seconds.

Also, diet is a HUGE factor that gets overlooked. I think about the people at work that are always sick...fat people or people who eat shit every day. Eating a balanced diet and not drinking too much (alcohol in excess weakens the immune system) is an excellent foundation to staying well.

[gringochileno]

(09-27-2012 12:21 PM)JohnKreese Wrote:  

As important as washing your hands is, I feel like being super-anal about it has downsides. Without exposure to some germs, your body isn't going to build up any resistance. I rarely get sick and am sure to expose myself to germs on a regular basis (I understand that billions of germs are floating around at all times) without running to wash my hands or use sanitizer every five seconds.

Also, diet is a HUGE factor that gets overlooked. I think about the people at work that are always sick...fat people or people who eat shit every day. Eating a balanced diet and not drinking too much (alcohol in excess weakens the immune system) is an excellent foundation to staying well.

There are downsides to everything but that doesn't mean the balance of benefits and costs doesn't go in one direction or another. Having clean hands is definitely less likely to make you sick than having dirty hands, even if "building up resistance" (which hasn't been demonstrated to exist in adults) might mitigate it to some extent. With the number of sources of germs we come into contact with every day, it is highly, highly doubtful that you could wash your hands so much that it made you more likely to get sick even if you were incredibly OCD about it. Remember that humans have not been living in large cities for a significant fraction of their evolutionary history--our immune systems aren't built to handle the level of exposure to pathogens that we get from being around so many other people all the time.

[BIGINJAPAN]

People usually fall ill in the coming months due to the acidity of their blood. Especially after Halloween and Thanksgiving. This is a great time to detox your body. So stop drinking for a couple weeks, get good workouts in, stay away from sugar and refined carbs, no dairy or red meat. Unless of the course the dairy is raw and the red meat being grass fed, hormone free.

Summer takes a toll on all of us as we tend to drink more and sleep less. A little known fact about the flu is alot of times it is not caused by us " catching " it from someone or somewhere but it is our body detoxifying itself.

Also the last thing you want to do is get vaccinated.

[gringochileno]

(09-27-2012 10:40 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

Also the last thing you want to do is get vaccinated.

This is a really bad piece of advice.

[BIGINJAPAN]

(09-27-2012 10:56 PM)gringochileno Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:40 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

Also the last thing you want to do is get vaccinated.

This is a really bad piece of advice.

You know there was a canadian study done this year that proved taking the flu vaccine increased your chances of getting the flu ?

Also 3 of the big pharma companies just paid out about $6,000,000,000 to the american government because there vaccines were found to be non effective. They got caught manipulating the data for the last 20-30 years.

[BIGINJAPAN]

http://www.vancouversun.com/health/Vanco...story.html

http://www.naturalnews.com/037302_flu_va...tions.html

http://www.naturalnews.com/036416_GlaxoS...arges.html

Took me 1 minute to find these. I could go on and on.

[BIGINJAPAN]

Not to mention are you even aware of what is in the vaccines ? I don't just mean the " medical ingredients " i also mean the perservatives ? I think if you did you probably wouldn't have made that comment.

Not to mention the US has the highest autistic rate in the world. Which correlates nicely with the highest vaccination rate.

[gringochileno]

(09-27-2012 11:00 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:56 PM)gringochileno Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:40 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

Also the last thing you want to do is get vaccinated.

This is a really bad piece of advice.

You know there was a canadian study done this year that proved taking the flu vaccine increased your chances of getting the flu ?

Also 3 of the big pharma companies just paid out about $6,000,000,000 to the american government because there vaccines were found to be non effective. They got caught manipulating the data for the last 20-30 years.

Links please. There is a lot of clinical data that directly contradicts that statement.

[BIGINJAPAN]

(09-27-2012 11:10 PM)gringochileno Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 11:00 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:56 PM)gringochileno Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:40 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

Also the last thing you want to do is get vaccinated.

This is a really bad piece of advice.

You know there was a canadian study done this year that proved taking the flu vaccine increased your chances of getting the flu ?

Also 3 of the big pharma companies just paid out about $6,000,000,000 to the american government because there vaccines were found to be non effective. They got caught manipulating the data for the last 20-30 years.

Links please. There is a lot of clinical data that directly contradicts that statement.

yeah clinical data that has been manipulated or even outright lied about. Last year Pfizer got caught faking a whole study that didn't even have any test subjects. I think the doctor actually went to jail on that one.

http://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/local...27667.html

[gringochileno]

(09-27-2012 11:06 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

http://www.vancouversun.com/health/Vanco...story.html

http://www.naturalnews.com/037302_flu_va...tions.html

http://www.naturalnews.com/036416_GlaxoS...arges.html

Took me 1 minute to find these. I could go on and on.

That is one lay-press story and two articles from a website (naturalnews.com) that I know for a fact to have a history of publishing false medical claims. I meant actual clinical data--maybe you can find that study at a place like Pubmed.

(09-27-2012 11:09 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

Not to mention are you even aware of what is in the vaccines ? I don't just mean the " medical ingredients " i also mean the perservatives ? I think if you did you probably wouldn't have made that comment.

Not to mention the US has the highest autistic rate in the world. Which correlates nicely with the highest vaccination rate.

Oh OK, you're one of those "Vaccines! Autism! Preservatives!!! Big Pharma!!!!" people. I have now learned two things:

1. Any medical advice you give is over 95% certain to be incorrect.
2. No amount of evidence will persuade you to change any of your views.

I'm not interested in banging my head against a brick wall right now so instead of debating you I will be content with having learned these two facts. If you don't want to get the flu, it's in your interest to get a flu vaccine and your kids won't get autism unless they were going to anyway.

[gringochileno]

(09-27-2012 11:15 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 11:10 PM)gringochileno Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 11:00 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:56 PM)gringochileno Wrote:  

(09-27-2012 10:40 PM)BIGINJAPAN Wrote:  

Also the last thing you want to do is get vaccinated.

This is a really bad piece of advice.

You know there was a canadian study done this year that proved taking the flu vaccine increased your chances of getting the flu ?

Also 3 of the big pharma companies just paid out about $6,000,000,000 to the american government because there vaccines were found to be non effective. They got caught manipulating the data for the last 20-30 years.

Links please. There is a lot of clinical data that directly contradicts that statement.

yeah clinical data that has been manipulated or even outright lied about. Last year Pfizer got caught faking a whole study that didn't even have any test subjects. I think the doctor actually went to jail on that one.

http://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/local...27667.html

You don't know what Celebrex is, do you? Hint: it has nothing to do with vaccines.

[BIGINJAPAN]

There is plenty of clinical data to support my claims.

But reading an article about what happened in a court of law is far less time consuming. A company doesn't pay out $3,000,000,000 because they did nothing wrong

[BIGINJAPAN]

I know what it is. And vioxx. The point is they are fabricating studies and in this case they didn't even have any patients