Constantly catching a cold? Take care of your gut!

What does the gut have to do with a cold? We all know that the gut absorbs our food, breaks it down to nutrients, provides the body with energy, and excretes again the rests of food. But the gut does much more. Did you know that the gut is home to about 80% of our entire immune system? These immune cells are mainly located in the intestinal mucosa. The mucosa, which makes 400 m2, protects the organism from germs coming from the environment through the food into the gut. As a result, our gut is working according to an ingenious immune system of three layers. The first layer, directly in contact with the ingested food, is the intestinal flora. This is so to speak the first line of defence towards the germs and intruders. The intestinal flora consists of more than 10 trillion microorganisms with a total weight of one to two kilograms. With about 500 different types of bacteria, the intestinal flora is almost a separate ecosystem, among other things responsible for breaking down the non-digestible rests of food like fibres through which the intestinal flora again draws energy from. The second line of defence is the intestinal mucosa as a mechanic barrier. The immune cells, which were referred to earlier, are located within the intestinal mucosa and make the third line of defence in the gut.

Consequently, our general body’s defence is highly depending on a healthy intestinal immune system. Through a disturbance of the barrier function, harmful nutritional components can more easily penetrate the body and cause diseases like hay fever or neurodermatitis. Moreover, a damage of the gut’s immune system can lead to a general immune deficiency in the entire body. Therefore, the cause of a disease, which apparently has nothing to do with the gut, still can be located in the gut.