My Suggested Actions if you Suspect Viral Infection

If I get any symptoms of a cold or flu or any viral infection I take:

Vitamin C

  • Either a powder or pill giving me a combination of 1 gram of vitamin C, plus 3mg of zinc, plus 50mg of elderberry extract, and I take this EVERY HOUR until symptoms have gone.
  • Practically, for example during the night, you can double the dose and take every 2 hours.
  • In most cases symptoms go within 12 to 24 hours. In 24 hours you will have taken 24 grams of vitamin C, 72mg of zinc and 1200mg of black elderberry extract.

Please note that 24 grams of vitamin C over 24 hours may give you looser bowels.

For children under age 12, divide dose by body weight. Eg if the child is half your weight halve the dose. As a rough guideline I’d give 250mg a day to children aged 3 to 8 for general health, and 250mg an hour if under viral attack, or up to bowel tolerance level.

My formulations ImmuneC and ImmuneC High Strength powder are potent formulations with nutrients working together in synergy.

Also consider the following:

Vitamin D

Vitamin D is also important as it modulates the immune system. It also helps lessen severity of respiratory lung infections, according to a British Medical Journal review. The majority of immune cells have a vitamin D receptors and some viruses turn this down. This may be a major reason why viruses can take hold in the winter. So make sure your vitamin D level is above 50nmol/l, ideally higher. You’ll need to be supplementing at least 15mcg (600iu) on a regular basis to achieve this but can top up levels for a month with 25mcg (1,000iu) a day, or seven times this amount, taken once a week as it stores. Expose yourself to sun whenever you can. I formulated Vitamin D3 3000iu as high strength for the winter months.

Selenium

The mineral selenium also inhibits viral replication, probably in a daily dose of 200mcg. This is more than you need when not infected. Selenium is critical for antioxidant enzymes that get depleted when under viral attack so it’s something you want to increase if seriously infected. It’s one of 7 nutrients in Age Antioxidant.

Ketogenic Dieting

Most viruses thrive on a high glucose environment. If you go ketogenic (all cells can run on ketones generated from fat) and autophagic that’s likely to be a big help. Autophagy is a cellular clean up programme that targets and gobbles up microbes such as viruses, that is triggered by fasting. In fasting you become ketogenic as your body switches to burning (body) fat. The 5 Day Diet book describes a five day diet, much easier than fasting, that switches on autophagy, is ketogenic, and is very high in immune supporting nutrients.

Look After Yourself!

Keep yourself hydrated, drink lots of water, ginger tea, keep warm, have hot baths and rest.