Hey Everyone, a warm welcome back to Nutrition Leaders UK 😀
If you have joined us previously or if you are joining us for the first time we are delighted for you to be with us
This week we are going to share with you some very valuable information from one of the top doctors in our Company Herbalife Nutrition.
This will be a 2 part blog as we feel this information is so important and valuable for everyone right now!
Both Karen and I are so privileged to know this gentleman really well having attended numerous trainings he has given over the years as well as getting to know him socially at more than one of our Companies brilliant fun parties… I can say I have even run a 5K with him in Bournemouth when it was wild, windy and very very wet although not surprisingly he beat me!!!
Without further ado let’s hand it over to the brilliant Dr Luigi Gratton
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Hi Everyone I’m Luigi Gratton, Herbalife Nutrition’s, Vice President of Training, and I have worked with Herbalife for 16 years and I am a Corporate Doctor and a member of the Scientific Advisory Board.
We know that these are challenging times for many of you. And we wanted to reach out and make sure that we gave you some of the basics on immune health, especially as it applies to nutrition.
You know a lot of the things that we're eating every day, whether it's food or Herbalife Nutrition products, have an association with good health and especially, good strong immune function.
Now, a little bit about me, I joined Herbalife in 2005. My background is in Clinical Nutrition. I went to school here in Los Angeles, California. And as I said, I've been working in training since 2005, working with our global network of Herbalife Nutrition Distributors, and today we're going to talk specifically about immune system functioning.
So, a lot of people are asking “What is the Immune System?”
Well, it's highly technical, and it's very complex.
So, we want to keep this really simple.
One of the ways our bodies uses the immune system is as a defence.
So, think about your house where you live, the walls and the alarm system you may have in your house or your apartment.
This is basically what the body has as a defence mechanism for invading pathogens.
So, what are pathogens?
Well, they consist of bacteria, viruses, fungi, all these different things that we don't want inside of our body in high amounts.
Now, a little bit of this, a little bit of that, is not going to bother us.
But when there's too many of these invading pathogens, we have got to fight them off, and we've got to eliminate them.
As soon as these invaders are detected, the immune systems activated.
Okay, so there are two types of immune response.
There's something we call the innate immune response. That simply means that there's an immediate reaction, then there's the adaptive immune response, the adaptive immune response takes a little bit more time.
So, think about the innate responses, quickly eliminating those bacteria and viruses or foreign material that enter the body. That's the fast reaction. And that's what our body does.
The adaptive immune response is really interesting because it's almost like creating a memory, and the immune system remembers a lot of these invading pathogens.
So, the next time they show up, they can eliminate them quickly.
It can take a bit more time to develop, but it's very precise, and very effective.
You know a lot of us, we eat Herbalife products, we have a great diet that's complete and balanced with our food.
But it's important to recognize every time we're eating our products and our food, we're also protecting our skin, we're getting good skin health, and the skin is the first physical barrier that helps in terms of these invading pathogens.
Now a lot of things live on our skin.
There's bacteria, viruses and fungi all over us all the time.
But we live in harmony with our environment, and we keep a lot of them outside of the body.
So, the skin is a very important area.
And that's why we love talking about SKIN Health in Herbalife.
Also, think about it sneezing, coughing, you have a lot of barrier protection that keeps some of these invading pathogens outside the body or kind of hanging outside so that we're living in harmony with them.
Now, there's also a chemical part of the innate system that's the mucus, the stomach acid, the enzymes, as soon as you eat food, it gets into the stomach and there's acid that's breaking down a lot of these invading pathogens that might be sitting on food that you're eating.
Okay, so physical, chemical, and of course, cellular for the innate system something that we call the phagocytes.
They turn on or they turn off. These are some of the immediate cells that start attacking these invading pathogens. So that's the innate.
The adaptive, of course, is what we talked about which are very specific and have a sort of learned response.
So, think about let's say someone with a bow and arrow, they know what to attack, so that’s how to visualise the innate and the adaptive so that you can kind of understand how they work.
I believe Herbalife Nutrition plays a big role in supporting people with their health by helping with good nutrition. And of course, we love to talk about living a healthy active lifestyle.
So those two things, in particular, really help build strong immune health.
Okay, so many of you have heard about our global nutrition philosophy, which is simply our roadmap on what we should be eating and consuming and what we should be doing.
There's vitamins and minerals, healthy fats, up to 30%, protein, rest hydration, carbohydrates and fibre, exercise and something called phytonutrients that many of you are aware of, which are simply plant based nutrients.
So, this is what Herbalife believes is most important for the body having this global approach to balanced nutrition.
Where you're consuming the right nutrients in the right ratios.
Now in Herbalife, the first thing that the founder of the company, a gentleman named Mark Hughes, the first thing he launched way back 40 years ago in 1980, was a protein shake. In fact, Herbalife today 40 years later, is the global leader in meal replacement shakes, which is pretty amazing when you consider there's a lot of different meal replacement shakes.
Now I'm not talking about just a tub of protein, I'm talking about a very specifically designed shake that has the right balance of protein, vitamins and minerals, fibre, a little bit of phytonutrients, and maybe some trace elements.
And that's very difficult to make.
We're very good at making these shakes, we've been doing it 40 years.
And protein is the important nutrient.
It's the primary driver in that shake, if you will, proteins, an essential component of every cell in the human body, including immune cells.
And that's why we know there's a strong association between protein, lean muscle mass, which is what we think of as having muscles, your biceps, your chest, triceps, all that good stuff.
When you eat healthy protein, it supports your lean muscle mass, and that is associated with a healthy immune system.
Now, this may seem a little bit complex, just recognize your body is a very complicated machine. It's got all kinds of things going on stomach, lungs, intestine, fat cells, your breathing mechanisms, your liver, your white and red blood cells, bone, skin.
All of these tissues require protein.
This is why there's a government minimum requirement wherever you may be living, whatever country you live in.
There is a recommended minimal intake of protein, so we don't starve, so you can't just drink water, breathe the air and make protein in your body.
We have to consume protein every single day and that's why there's a government minimum.
Now in Herbalife, we believe.
Often the government minimum may be enough if you're sitting around all day, but when you've got kids in a busy active lifestyle or you're running around as a Herbalife Nutrition Distributor, you may need a little bit more.
That's why we recommend a certain amount to make sure you service the body. I just told you what protein is it's the structural component for the body.
Now a lot of people have a balance. We call them omnivores, they have animal nutrient nutrients and they have plant-based nutrients. So, if they're having milk, if they're having dairy, they're fine with having whey protein so take a look at our high protein iced coffee, which has a whey protein source.
And if you take a look also at Herbalife 24 Rebuild Strength which is also made of a very high-quality whey protein.
Now for those of you who only want to do plant-based nutrients, Soy we believe is a fantastic source because it has all the amino acids in one plant.
So, for those of you who say well, I don't really care for Soy, no problem!
We're going to use other plant-based nutrients such as Pea, quinoa and flax in our award-winning Tri-Blend Select.
So, you have these three different plant-based sources of protein, whey, soy, or other plant-based sources Pea, Quinoa and flax.
And those all are giving you the essential amino acids. And that simply means again, if you're building a structure, and you're building tissue in the human body, you have to have all these essential amino acids. You can't just have one, you can't have two you need the full complement.
That's what Herbalife provides.
When you think of our hero product, which a lot of people first started with which is our Formula 1-Healthy Meal and the important thing is it comes down to a balanced healthy meal.
It contains 25, vitamins and minerals.
And it has these really important vitamins and minerals that we like to talk about when we're talking about supporting the immune system, vitamin A, C, D, B, 12, zinc, folate and selenium.
We've got them all in the shake.
And these of course, are very important in terms of association with healthy immune function.
Now remember, protein keeps healthy, lean muscle mass and when you have healthy lean muscle mass you don't have to be a super big, strong weightlifter.
As long as you feel good and you know you're at your optimal weight that's important.
And that lean muscle mass is associated with immune function.
Whether using Formula 1 Healthy Meal or a Tri-Blend Select, think about a natural source of protein, fibre and vitamin C.
So, it doesn't matter the source of the protein. Just understand that as long as it has all the essential amino acids. That's the key.
Now, in a lot of our foods, we don't talk about fibre.
What is fibre?
Well, think about if you go outside right now…
I know a lot of us are staying indoors but if you did go outside and you started finding plants and you started taking some plants that you see maybe a bush, a tree and you start chewing on it?
Well, guess what, those plants, those trees, all those things out in nature have fibre.
And when we consume fibre, we do not digest it, it moves through us without us having to digest it.
The great thing is there are two types of fibre.
There's the soluble fibre, which moves sort of slowly through our body.
And then of course, there's the insoluble fibre that just moves through you very quickly.
And that's what gives us regular bowel function.
So, we talked about the insoluble and the soluble types of Fibre because we need both of them, as they're very essential in the human diet.
Why is this very important for immune function?
Well, think about where the food goes in your body, we call it the alimentary canal, but it's your digestive system and through that digestive system, you have different things, you've got cells, and believe it or not, you've got what's called a microbiome.
It's an assortment of microbes, bacteria and other different types of microbes and they need healthy fibre to eat.
So, when they get healthy fibre to eat, they help support the immune system.
That means a huge part of your immune system is in your digestive tract and the amount of healthy fibre you eat, not just some you know, not just a bowl of oats.
It's really important associated with immune health.
So which Herbalife Nutrition products have fibre?
Well, think about taking our Formula 1 Health Meal and mixing it with our delicious Oat Apple Fibre product.
If you're using one scoop of our Oat Apple Fibre product, there's 5 grams of fibre per serving (same as an apple), and of course you could use it with our Tri-Blend and if you're going to use something like our Beta Heart product there is six grams of fibre per serving.
Now think about it...
It doesn't matter what country you live in.
Every government and regulatory agency recommend about 25- 30 grams of fibre,
However, here’s the big problem the average person in your country I can guarantee you, is only getting about 14 to 15 grams a day!
So, everyone's at a deficit!!!
This is where Herbalife Nutrition for the last 40 years since 1980 has done such great work because we encourage people to eat healthy food and we help our Customers and Distributors meet this 25-30 grams of Fibre per day requirement.
Now, of course, we want everyone eating a healthy diet, a balanced diet, we want to encourage that.
But this is where our products are really, really crucial.
We can help people meet their protein, vitamin and minerals and fibre goals by filling in the gaps that otherwise they would be missing...
(This is the end for now of part 1 of this 2 part blog. More to come next week)...
Meanwhile keep safe and take care of yourselves!
Hugs Stephen & Karen X
