Green dentist Dr. Nammy Patel talks about COVID-19, and gives her thoughts on COVID-19 fears, building your immune system, focusing on mental wellbeing, and paying attention to eating right.
Hillary: We’re just here today to ask a couple of questions about what’s going on in the world, and definitely the first topic on everyone’s mind is COVID-19. So, care to share your thoughts on that?
Dr. Nammy: Yes, absolutely. We are way scared. Insanely scared about COVID-19. Mainly it’s because we don’t understand it. We don’t know how to cope with it, and also all the media attention that we’ve been getting. My thoughts and feelings about COVID-19 is that this is an opportunity for us to really take control of our fears. As a society, we have been around for hundreds of thousands of years. Human beings have survived and this battle against COVID-19 is an opportunity for us to really know that we are a species that does survive. Meaning that we take control over COVID-19 by managing our fears.
Really, we know that COVID-19 is not going to kill everyone. It can’t. There are more people dying of the Influenza than there are people who are dying of COVID-19. The real fear around it is because… It’s just really we don’t know so much about it and so quickly. Coronavirus is basically a virus that basically has crowns on top. When you look underneath a microscope, this is the first type that has actually gone from a species of animals to humans and that’s what scares us. Our immune system is well equipped to go ahead and kill the virus, especially if you’re young and healthy like you. The people that really get concerned are the elderly and the immunocompromised, especially if you’ve had history of cancer or diabetes or any sort of respiratory issues or anything along those lines, which makes sense. So what I’m here to say, Hillary, is that we need to focus our efforts on building our immune system.
We need to take this time that we have as society to slow down, really take the time that we have to focus on our mental wellbeing. We have been on our rat race, go, go, go, go. And this is an opportunity for us to really come out stronger. By that, what I mean is that we can actually utilize this time to really focus on ourselves, our mental, our emotional, our physical wellbeing. It’s really important. One of the things that I practice in order to boost my immune system is, in the mornings when I wake up, I always do 20 minutes of breath work. Breathing through your nose is one of the most important things you can do for yourself. When you’re breathing through your nose, you are activating nitric oxide. You’re activating all the hormones, you’re activating your immune system to really get rid of all the bad bugs and really boost your immunity against anything, whether it’s COVID-19 or Influenza or whatever.
So that’s the most important thing that we can do for ourselves. The second is, let’s pay attention to what we eat. It is no longer fast food at lunchtime. Let’s really look at what’s going into our foods. Let’s cook at home. Let’s utilize these wonderful spices that we can use like cardamom, cinnamon, red chili flakes, even Thai chilies. These are all really great at building the antioxidants in our body so that, again, we can fight off any bugs, viruses, anything that’s out there. So those are two basic things that I really recommend, to start off by taking total control of “what are the things that we can do in order to boost our immunity”. Not to mention drinking enough water and exercising. There is this chaos right now about we cannot be… We need to stay indoors. Yes, stay indoors, but you can go for a 15-, 20-minute walk, especially if you’re healthy.
Now if you’re older, immunocompromised, yeah, don’t do it. Use judgment. But for somebody like you, who’s super young, super healthy, get out, get some fresh air. That fresh air is so good for us. It’s filled with oxygen and oxygen is the fuel we need to fight any bug. So let’s use a little bit of our own senses and let’s really take that control back and come into a space of knowing that we will come out stronger. We are going to survive and we are going to be really happy.
Hillary: Well, two things. I definitely noticed my breathing. You were talking about breathing. And second, I noticed I have been cooking a lot more at home and trying new recipes. So definitely I can start doing more of that.
Dr. Nammy: Yeah, for sure. And utilize some spices, get some cardamom, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Get that in there, make it a little spicy. And spices make us sweat. And that’s what actually is building our immune system. It’s really getting all those cytokines actively working so that it’s going to take care of anything that’s going to be in our bodies, so, for sure.
Hillary: Great, well thanks for all the info on that.
Dr. Nammy: You’re welcome.
