Shorter colds, milder flu may follow from newly revealed immune mechanism
Enlisted to help fight viral infections, immune cells called macrophages consume virus-infected cells to stop the spread of the disease in the body. Now researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have uncovered how macrophages keep from succumbing to the infection themselves. Boosting this mechanism may be a way to speed recovery from respiratory infections. The r...Proof that Vitamin C may be effective in combating colds
Vitamin C has been believed, over the years, to be a potential cure against the common cold. The belief has now been proved to be true by researchers who have studied changes in immune cells' response to vitamin C. The researchers reported that in their study of 12 healthy subjects who took one gram of vitamin C a day for two weeks, they found a boosted immune system response in all of them durin...Metapneumovirus - a common cause of adults' colds, kids' illness
Researchers are beginning to piece together the scope of this ubiquitous but overlooked bug, which now appears to afflict just about everybody, probably over and over.Even though the virus seems to be rarely serious, its vast presence intrigues microbiologists.// Like many other respiratory bugs, this one is most likely to cause severe illness in infants encountering it for the first...Daily Gargling May Prevent Common Colds
Kazunari Satomura and his research team from Kyoto University have found that daily gargling with povidione-iodine reduced the chances of getting common cold.// The results of the study have been published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. The study was conducted in 387 healthy volunteers between the age group of 18 to 65. The study recruits were divided into t...Exercise helps keep colds away
According to a recent research, daily moderate exercise helps in keeping colds at bay.This study published in the November issue of the American Journal of Medicine// reports that there was 50% reduction in the number of attacks of cold in older women who walked for half-an-hour daily for one year when compared to those who did not exercise. "There's been a lot of anecdotal evidence...Sioux Herb Confirmed as Shield Against Colds
Echinacea, a medicinal herb that came to prominence thanks to its use by Sioux Indians, can more than halve the risk of catching a cold, a wide-scale study has confirmed. Taking echinacea supplements can reduce the risk of a cold by 58 percent and may also shorten the duration of a cold almost one and a half days, according to the paper, published on Sunday in the July issue of the...