Chinese herbs improve the bodies' immunity system to fight the flu

Jia Ling, internal medicine doctor at the United Family Hospital and Clinics, found incoming patient Tony Loka in bad shape. He felt terrible, his nose wouldn't stop running and he was starting to cough.

After tests, she diagnosed a type A flu virus.

She prescribed Tamiflu, an anti-flu virus medicine, along with other medication to alleviate the cough and runny nose and some Vitamin C to help him maintain his immunity capacity.

She also suggested he rest, sleep early, drink 3 litres of water a day and avoid oily and spicy food. Click here to learn Acute Lymphangitis in TCM.

Since flu is highly infectious, Jia also advised him to avoid close physical contact with other people, and, in future, to avoid going to places where the ventilation is poor.

"Tamiflu is effective only for people who come to see us within 48 hours after they catch a flu," explained Jia.

If people see a doctor later than that, she would probably just prescribe medicines to alleviate the symptoms because there are no medicines that can directly affect the flu virus.

In this case, people would need to rely on their own bodies' immunity system to fight the flu.

Usually it takes from 4 or 5 days to two weeks for people to recover fully from it. Click here to learn Erythema Multiforme in TCM.

But delay seeing a doctor runs the risk of pneumonia.

Xu Wenbing, director of the Hope Institute of Chinese Medicine, said that there are two main factors in Loka's case, judging from the symptoms.

He was affected by wind and cold factors from the outside at a time when there was a phlegm-like matter and excessive heat in the lung. The two factors worked together to cause flu.

Xue said that traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) divides effects of outside harmful factors into six categories according to people's different symptoms. These are wind, coldness, heat, humidity, dryness and fire.

TCM's technique is to use medicine to support the body's own immunity system, so that it can be strong enough to fight against flu.

Xu prescribes, in Loka's case, mahuang (Chinese ephedra), gancao (licorice root), shigao, (gesso),and xingren (apricot kernel).

Mahuang and gancao are used to dispel the wind and coldness from the body, while shigao and xingren are to clear the phlegm and heat in the lung.

Article source: Chinadaily