What's the best way to strengthen the immune system?

Factual Questions
1

I’ve heard from doctors that fruits and vegetables are good for the immune system because of the vitamins and minerals supplied. But which vitamins and minerals are the most crucial? Which specific fruits/veggies are the best providers of those? Would multi-vitamins work just as well? Any other tips? For example, I’ve heard that stress, alcohol, and fat are bad for the immune system…

I tend to get sick more than the average Joe, and anything to improve the odds would be great.

2

There is a theory that the immune system needs to stay in training, so perhaps you need to eat a few grains of dirt each day - maybe build up to a half-teaspoonful of dirt eventually. :dubious:

3

Apparently you can get some help from eating particular kinds of ants.

But, as far as the fruits and vegetables, the University of Cincinnati says:

I haven’t been able to find much corroboration for that, though.

4

Fruits and vegetables are good for the body for a number of reasons additional to their vitamin content;
-they contain fibre, which is essential to the proper function of the digestive system.
-they contain food, in the form of sugars, starches, fats - of course you can get this from processed sources.
-they contain minerals and other beneficial compunds that aren’t necessarily classified as vitamins; some of these are directly beneficial to your body - in that they play a first-hand role in some routine bit of body chemistry or other. Others are indirectly beneficial - perhaps stimulating the secretion of some digestive enzyme, which in turn might enable you to process a different nutrient more effectively.

I don’t think it would even be too much of a stretch to suggest a psychological benefit from eating fresh fruit and veg, with a real physiological knock-on effect - the mere smell of fresh, natural food can be enough to kickstart your digestion that a handful of pills would.

The human body is adapted to receiving its nutrition (in the broader sense of the word that includes more than just calories) in the form of a varied, realtively unprocessed diet, it is very adaptable though and can actually cope with all sorts of imbalances and temporary deficiencies. It would probably be possible for an artificial processed diet to fulfil all of the body’s needs but in practice, I think processed foods and supplements tend to fall short of this - perhaps not in a dangerous way, maybe just in a way that could be described as suboptimal (although it is of course entirely possible to have a suboptimal natural diet).

If I had to sum it up as briefly as possible, I’d say ‘wide variety’ is the best diet.

Although I do feel quite confident about the above, IANANutritionist, so none of what I’ve said is the law.

5

Correction:

6

Here’s the link, for completeness: http://biology.clc.uc.edu/courses/bio105/immune.htm

7

You can also strengthen your resistance to illnesses by getting them and then recovering from them. You never have the same cold twice. Course, there are lots of variations, so it may take you some time to get through them all.
But I doubt this is quite what you are lookiing for. Sorry.

8

I was under the impression that the immunity to a given strain of cold virus lasted only a few years, after which you can indeed get the same cold again.

I managed to get through the last few years without catching any at all, but the one that hit me last month was nasty…

9

eat much less. (caloric restriction)

exercise.

possibly, synthesized chemicals or natural herbs.