Disclaimer
I have been asked to write an article on, what currently is, most concerned health topic of all time. The Coronavirus. Before you read ahead, please understand that I am just a personal trainer with strength training and nutrition background and am not medical practitioner. Please be mindful that what I write here is strictly my opinion and thought behind our current situation. Even after following advice suggested in this article, there still will be a chance of Coronavirus may affect your health. Please consult with your physician to have more precise and effective plan going forward.
What is happening?
Since December 2019, we have been aware of new pneumonia virus called Coronavirus (COVID-19) started to affect health of China. Week after week, rather than the virus becomes weaker, it has gotten stronger to the point it is affecting the entire planet. Currently, it is affecting lives of people to the point school, amusement park, public transportation including cruising and air transport to be postponed until further notice.
Fear of the Coronavirus has gotten to the point every mask and sanitizers are out of stock even on online. In some cities of Japan, people have started to purchase all necessities as much as they can and toilet paper, rice, and instant foods are pretty much all sold out. Even in the U.S., CDC has increased the security level on traveling to China, Korea, Italy to level 3 out of 4. Level 3 by the way is to have individuals to re-evaluate the necessity of the trip. United Airline have announced cancellation of their flight to China, Korea, Tokyo and Osaka until mid to late April.
So do we really need to be alerted about this COVID-19? Are we overreacting on this issue because of how media is explaining? Well, from what I have read so far, here is my understanding about Coronavirus.
What Are Some Trend?
There has been many casualties because of this virus and we cannot ignore this fact. Even if the media has been putting extra number to the real number, fact that people are dying from this virus is real. Therefore, we should be mindful and be cautious about what is happening to our own health. However, there seems to be a common trend.
First trend is outbreak of Coronavirus has been seen in elder (>65yr) and younger (<10yr) population. Not too many but there has been unfortunate individual who lost their lives by COVID-19 who are in between those ages. However, this stats didn't make me node my head and say this is the reason. However, mind started to lead to another possible trend.
From the first trend, second trend that I'm hypothesizing is immune system strength of those people who have suffered and suffering from the virus. Just like any other virus like, flue, HIV, cancer, and so on, there is a high chance that we are exposed to them on regular basis.
This shouldn't be surprising to you. Our body is fighting against more virus and illness risk factors than we can imagine. There may be a virus that we have not even aware of yet that our body is fighting off from. Because of our immune system, we are able to avoid getting infected by those virus and illnesses. In fact we may already have been exposed to Coronavirus and our immune system may be fighting it off. But what if condition of the immune system was low? With condition such as hypertension, thyroid issues, heart diseases, insulin resistance, diabetes, lack of sleep, poor eating habit, over consumption of alcohol, smoking, drugs can increase chance of ourselves with outbreak of those virus and illnesses.
How can we avoid Coronavirus outbreak?
Although there are so many unknown factors about this virus, however, from the trend I'm seeing, here are 4 things that I would recommend. Please keep in mind that just because you've followed the recommendation below, it does not guarantee you will not be affected by Coronavirus. However, it is possible that it can lower the risk. Check with your physician before applying recommendation below.
1. Wash your hands more frequently
This is what you may already have been doing. Wash your hands. Even without sanitizer you can wash your hands. Every time you interact with others, make sure to wash your hands.
2. Clean your nasal pathway and throat
This one may not be fun. It is very effective to get rid of trash immediately than leave them in your system. Using nasal spray, nasal flushing, gargle, or any technique that you know to clean out your nasal and breathing pathway, you should be performing at least once a day.
3. Improve your overall health
Do you have bloating, digestive issue, high blood pressure, blood sugar level, insulin level, thyroid issue or any other health issues? You better get on the dietary and fitness program to get them under control.
Some advice I can give is to control your insulin level first. You can do this by minimizing sugar and refined carbohydrate. Another factors that can elevate your insulin level is lack of sleep and mineral deficiencies. One night of sleep deprivation can set you to, although it is acute, insulin resistance.
Lacking sodium, magnesium, chromium, zinc, can lead you to metabolic issues, which will affect your immunity. If you are on any medications, work with your physician and find the plan to get off from it. Medication is great by controlling your specific condition but it does impact so many other health benefit.
Increasing vegetable intake can help increase antioxidant and may help improve your immune system. Reason why fruit is not added is because of sugar.
Drink more water. Water is required for so many functions in your body. You don't like drinking water? Well you are old enough to make decision or discipline yourself right? Work on it.
4. Don't freak out and do what you can do now
Although Coronavirus brings out fear within us and cause us to panic, but Coronavirus is no different from other flu, cancer, and other illnesses. There is no need to over react by purchasing everything you can purchase at the store. More importantly think of what you can do to improve your health condition. Are you physically active? Are you recovering on regular basis? Is your eating under control? If you are not sure to these questions, get it straightened out with your trainer, physician, dietitian or someone who has understanding and has interest in improving your health.
Real Concern
Here is my concern. Knowing what health condition the US population is in now, there can be a huge wave of casualty coming because of this virus. Even with just regular flu this year, it has taking away so many lives. Thinking of obesity, diabetic, cancer rate in the US we will see some damage if we do not take responsibility of improving our own health.
If the Coronavirus is man made virus, according to some rumor, this may subside eventually and may never happen again. However, if this is natural phenomenon and will be a seasonal thing, we need to be ready for it just like how we prepare for flu.
Real concern is many are waiting for some doctor, government officials or some genius to come up with solution, but the real question is what are you going to do? Have you been exercising on regular basis as you should be? Are you cheating on your diet too frequently and noticing physical and health decline? Have you been sleep deprived because of you "needed" to watch that TV show at 10pm although you need to wake up at 4am? Are you thinking there will be a magical pill coming out for the cure?
Yes, we are facing an issue. And the issue is serious and may lead to death. Many are talking about Coronavirus is like a flu. Yet, it seems to not have flu like symptoms and lead straight into pneumonia as the first symptom. That is the tricky and scary part.
But my huge concern and fear is more on individual level, rather than Coronavirus itself. How are we responding to it? From media stand point we are not doing too good. There are so many misleading information by some "genius" thinking they can get some sort of business out of this situation. Are we just relying on others to solve the problem while we are doing nothing but panicking and emptying out the store?
Conclusion
At this point, there aren't many options to fight against Coronavirus. It is tricky virus and we do not know when the cure or vaccine will be available. However, what we can do now is to treat this like any other virus or illnesses and we should be able to coupe with this illness. What you need to do now is improve on your current health condition rather than panicking.
Again, this is my personal view point and opinion. I'm not a medical practitioner so consult with your physician if you have any concern.
Stay Healthy,
Kota Shimada
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