Think about the people in your life — who gets sick more often and more severely and who doesn’t? New research published online in the British Journal of Sports Medicine says that chances are, those who seem to always avoid colds or only suffer symptoms for a short blip are fitter than those who don’t.

Researchers looked at 1,000 adults’ respiratory health for 12 weeks during the autumn and winter of 2008. They also looked at the subjects self-reported data on how frequently they participated in aerobic exercise, their fitness level, what their lifestyle was like, what foods they ate and any recent stressful events, as all can affect the immune system. As you might imagine, the overall number of days of cold symptoms was different in winter and autumn — in winter the subjects had an average of 13 days of cold symptoms and 18 days in the fall.
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The most effective way to fight the flu is to be vaccinated, which causes your body to make antibodies that target specific illnesses. That’s what most experts will say, anyway.

But, nature may be just as effective. Your diet can provide a boost to your immune system, which can help you get through the flu season without so much as a sniffle. Here are some of the best immune-boosting foods, with a couple lesser known choices:

Garlic

Vampires are popular these days. Will their nemesis, garlic, follow? The stinking rose, as it’s sometimes called, contains allicin, a phytochemical that may lower cholesterol and make blood platelets less sticky, which cuts the risk of clots.

But, this tasty relative of the onion has more to offer.

“Garlic apparently stimulates the body’s immune system, particularly enhancing the macrophages and lymphocytes, which destroy cancer cells,” says Dr. Benjamin Lau, physician and author of the book, Garlic for Health.
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It’s a safe bet that several of you have been feeling under the weather recently. Although we are more susceptible to germs and illness when worn down physically, mentally, or emotionally; sometimes illness just seems to attack (and often at the most inopportune times). Unfortunately, as adults we can’t depend on our moms to make us chicken noodle soup and we have responsibilities that do not allow for sick days. Keeping yourself in healthy mental, emotional, and physical states is a major responsibility. It’s something that we have to work at every day and something we have to work harder at when one of those areas is suffering.
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I’ve always thought that the idea of the flu being more common in the winter was just an old wives tale. But apparently, not only is it actually true, but experts now know why.

A new study found that influenza germs last longer and pass from person to person more effectively in lower absolute humidity, when it’s cold outside and the air is dryer. Absolute humidity is a measurement of the total amount of water vapor in the air at a given temperature.
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