Get sick.
No, seriously. That’s it. Get sick. It will get your immune system working like nothing else can, guaranteed.
People have this idea that the immune system is like a neighborhood watch, cruising around your body looking for suspicious characters and picking them off before they can do any damage. That’s. . .not even wrong.
Skeptical Raptor has an excellent article called Boosting the immune system–sorting science from myth, and you should go read it, but I’m going to take the part that explains how it works and share it here. First, the Innate Immune System. . .
This is the immune system’s ability to prevent or detect foreign material, then eliminate it without a specific physiological response of the body. It is the body’s quick and initial response to disease causing organisms (pathogens) which invade our body. The innate response either directly prevents an infection or slows it sufficiently for the slower but more effective and selective adaptive Immune system to activate. But it isn’t a simple system, the innate immune system is extremely complex, consisting of:
Anatomical barriers–These consist of physical barriers. The skin itself is impermeable to pathogens providing defenses like a solid wall. Our nasal passage is lined with mucous that is constantly moved into the stomach catching pathogens and killing them. Our eyes are covered in caustic tears and our mouths in saliva which contains a variety of enzymes. all these ensure that the vast majority of pathogens are killed before they can even enter an area where they can cause harm.
Inflammation–This response include the symptoms we associate with inflammation, fever, swelling, increased blood flow, and other activities, is due to the localized response of the body to the presence of a foreign body or pathogen. It’s main purpose is to provide a physical barrier to control the spread of infection and to heal damaged tissue in the region. Damaged cells release an array of chemical factors which cause pain and blood vessels to become more permeable. This response then attracts phagocytes, cells which recognize and consume foreign or dead tissue. Inflammation is normally a healthy response to injury or pathogen invasion, but in some autoimmune diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis, it can be painful and debilitating.
Complement System–This system is group of biochemicals, produced by the liver, that helps or “complements” the ability of antibodies and phagocytic cells to clear pathogens from an organism. It is part of the immune system that is not adaptable and does not change over the course of an individual’s lifetime. However, it can be recruited and brought into action by the adaptive immune system.
Cells–Mostly white blood cells (WBC) are involved in the innate immune system:
Mast Cells – A group of cells that mediate the inflammatory response. Although they are often associated with allergies, they are a critical part of the immune response.
Phagocytes – Large cells that move like amoeba. They “eat” other cells by surrounding them with their plasma membranes producing “bubbles” in which they can release enzymes safely without damaging other cells. They also have a “clean-up” role to remove the body’s dead and dying cells.
Macrophages – Large phagocytic cells that efficiently consume multiple pathogens. Heavily motile and actively cross from the blood stream into tissue to hunt down pathogens. They kill by manufacturing and releasing free-radical oxygen in a local area.
Neutrophils/Eosinophils/Basophils – A group of similar cells that are the “first responders” to migrate to an inflammation site. They appear at the site of a wound within a few minutes of trauma.
Natural Killer Cells – These cells recognize the body’s own cells that are infected by viruses or are cancerous. They then induce controlled cell death to halt the spread of the infected or cancerous cells. Recent research shows that Natural Killer Cells also play a role in the adaptive immune response.
Dendritic Cells and Gamma/Delta T Cells – These are the bridge between the innate and adaptive systems and their main role is antigen presentation. They harvest antigenic proteins from damaged pathogens and present them to T-Cells, which allows them to find and attack the pathogens.
Then there’s the Adaptive Immune System.
The dendritic cells, from the innate immune system, activate the body’s adaptive (or acquired) immune system. The adaptive immune system is composed of highly specialized, systemic cells and processes that eliminate or prevent pathogen growth. In acquired immunity, pathogen-specific receptors are “acquired” during the lifetime of the organism (whereas in innate immunity pathogen-specific receptors are already encoded in the germline). The acquired response is said to be “adaptive” because it prepares the body’s immune system for future pathogenic challenges. In some cases, the acquired immune response can be maladaptive when it results in autoimmunity. Antibodies, produced by B-lymphocyte cells, are the main weapon of the body’s immune system to battle pathogens. It is a larger response than innate immunity and once sensitized to an antigen, the adaptive immune system often fights of diseases even before we can exhibit symptoms of disease. Immunizations introduce the pathogen’s antigen to the adaptive immune system so that it can form those pathogen-specific receptors and, thereby, are able to quickly and efficiently respond to an attack by a pathogen.
Cells involved –There are three types of cells involved with the adaptive immune response:
T – Lymphocytes (also known as T-cell) – The main role of the cell is to recognise cells infected by viruses and trigger the apoptotic pathway that destroys the cell and its viral contamination. Since viruses only replicate inside cells by hijacking the cell’s manufacturing process, this apoptosis kills the virus (and the host cell) and phagocytes swoop in to consume the destroyed cell debris and digest the contents. The antigen of the viral cell is recognised by surface antibodies on the T-Lymphocyte, which activate it. There are also helper T-Cells whose role is control and organisation of the apoptosis response to the infected cells.
B – Lymphocytes – The main role of these cells is to produce humoral (free floating) antibodies that recognise pathogens and mark them for destruction by other cells. This process occurs by activating the complement system and by causing the pathogen to become “sticky” but only with other pathogens. This causes them to clump together and make them easier to kill by T-cells.
Memory Cells – After an infection has passed (and most of the T-cells and B-cells have died), a few do remain in circulation to remember the antigens of the pathogens who attacked. In future infections these are rapidly activated to produce a humoral response which quickly destroys any new infections even before they produce any symptoms. There are two types of these cells: Memory B cells, which, produce the antibodies that recognize the pathogens, and Memory T cells, which remember the viral antigens that infect cells.
The article continues with more specific information about how the system works, but essentially, most of the immune system’s action consists of responding to a pathogen. Ergo, if you want to “boost” it, then you need to introduce a pathogen into your system to make it work. So get sick.
If you want to boost it a little, you can cut yourself and get it infected. Some food poisoning or a common communicable disease can boost it some more. A chronic condition is the gift that keeps on giving – your immune system will constantly be boosted.
But if you really want to boost your immune system to the max, then you need to go for an autoimmune disorder. This will boost your immune system so much that it won’t attack just harmful invaders, but your own cells. Even though they’re cells you’d kind of like to keep. I’d suggest Diabetes, that’s one that’s a little easier to self-induce. But there’s always Lupus, or Multiple Sclerosis, maybe Rheumatoid Arthritis. Get yourself one of those, and you will have one of the most boosted immune systems it’s possible to have.
Unfortunately, no amount of boosting your immune system is going to make you healthier. And that’s why, even if those ads for stuff that “boosts your immune system” sold stuff that worked, you really wouldn’t want it.