Immune System Part 1: How it Works. A Crash Course.

And some talk about COVID-19.

The immune system is definitely all the talk these days. With that, the internet is being filled with a lot of misguiding information about how to treat and prevent COVID-19 infections. From drinking 3 tablespoons of turmeric in water 3 times a day, to breathing hot air out of a blow-dryer. It is getting a little out of hand. Currently there are no cures, researched treatments or vaccinations for the virus. Most hospitals dealing with severe cases have been treating with medications to reduce fever, keeping hydration in check and supplying oxygen. Some hospitals have been using anti-viral medications, with each country following their own protocols. In North America, especially in the US, hydroxychloroquine (an anti-malarial drug also used in lupus and rheumatoid arthritis) is currently being used.

Recently in New York it has been shown to greatly reduce symptoms in combination with intravenous Vitamin C. Most treatments you will hear about on the media will be based on what doctors have seen improve symptoms in their patients. With research either having been done in other conditions or using it based on what it does in the body. All of these treatments being theoretical and observational.

Anyways, the immune system.

I can go on for pages about the immune system (was my undergrad and fascination after all). But here is the scoop. Our body has various barriers in place to protect us. They consist of three layers; physical, biochemical and cellular immunity.

Physical Barriers consist mostly of skin, the lining in the digestive tract and the respiratory tract. Pretty much anything that touches the outside world (your lungs, stomach, intestines etc). Hair protects us from debris. Cilia (little hairs) in the lungs keep our airways clear by moving stuff up and out. Or eyelashes, that prevent dirt going into our eyes.

Biochemical Barriers consist of body secretions such as sweat and tears, acid in our stomach, mucus, saliva and bile. All of these do their job by physically clearing any foreign intruders or by chemically destroying them by use of acidic/alkaline environments or having antibodies in them.

Cellular Immunity is the most complex of the three. Because of the huge complex pathways it consists and also by our hindered ability to truly study what exactly goes on in the body when a certain intruder invades us. This system include many immune cells and antibodies that I won’t cover fully here. They include the infamous white blood cells (also called Leukocytes that contains many different types of cells), B cells and T cells.

Now of course. These barriers don’t work alone but together. Which in a conventional medicine standpoint and in simple words, sucks. Drugs tend to focus on symptoms or a specific entity. There is no one thing to support or one thing to fight against when intruders invade our system, or when our bodies attack ourselves as in autoimmune conditions (which is even more complex). The immune system combines the above 3 barriers into an Innate Immunity and an Adaptive Immunity.

Innate Immunity is known as the fast but not very specific response. It attacks everything foreign. This uses the physical and the chemical barriers above alongside some general immune responses by white blood cells and inflammatory responses. The white blood cells generally just find anything strange and destroys it. Of course things will escape, overload and/or sneak past into our systems. Viruses being very very small do this.

Adaptive Immunity then comes to the rescue. This is where it gets even more complicated and I don’t want to lose you. Pretty much this immunity takes time but is highly specific. The mentioned earlier B Cell and T Cells work to create specific antibodies and antigens to what has invaded your body. These antibodies and antigens help the immune system track the invaders and destroy them. This response takes a long time since those cells are creating constant antibodies to find one that works. Once it is learned then your body will recognize that invader the next time it tries to come into your body while getting rid of it without you even knowing (not showing symptoms).

That is where vaccinations came in. A wonderful tool that doesn’t focus on one aspect but the whole system! It allows the body to recognize an invader and create it’s own immune response without creating many symptoms; adaptive immunity. Then your body has learned it, for a long time. We get most of our symptoms from our system overreacting to invaders, especially if those invaders start to replicate and grow in numbers. So with vaccinations we train the body to recognize it quicker.

Another thing to point out is that healthy populations without any preexisting conditions can have this adaptive immunity to invaders regularly without showing any or few symptoms. This means that their immune system adapted quickly on its own or it came across a similar invader before and their body has adapted to controlling it. This doesn’t mean that they aren’t walking around with the virus inside them, giving it to other people who may not handle it as effectively. Viruses are tricky. They change their signature (‘shape’) a lot so our body must be adaptive to new infections. And this is where vaccination development can fail and why it takes so long to create effective ones.

Your immune system fluctuates in effectiveness even as a healthy individual, and yours is unique compared to the next person. What you have come across in your lifetime shapes you inside and out. Your body will adapt to what is put into your body a little differently than the next person. And how much sleep you get, nutrient deficiencies, if you are already battling an infection, the supplements you take, your age and so much more are factors in how strong and optimal your immune response will be. A topic for another day.