How prepare your body for self isolation during coronavirus pandemic

 

Dear Friends,

Every single reasonable medical practitioner I know confirms that in their informed opinion we are in for a VERY DIFFICULT TIME.

Most likely, in about a week, following a pattern to be gleaned from other European countries, we shall see a rapid increase in the number of infections and deaths, brutal facts that it will not be possible to hide.

What can we do?

Some of the things that we have done so far: stay at home; take your family for a walk in a car to be far away from other people.

Those who live in detached housing are in a more comfortable situation but residents of apartment blocks and towers MUST assume that COVID-19 is already there, in your staircase, and especially in your elevators.

Leaving your apartment with no precautions and protections (touching anything with your bare hands and fingers) is a serious threat. On leaving the elevator immediately disinfect your hands before you touch anything.

If you have to leave home or you cannot possibly stay there, make sure to PLAN YOUR EXIT, and make sure you PLAN EVERY STEP of the way like a sapper in a mine field. Use a face mask, glasses and gloves. Mind your children so that they do not touch anything in the staircase or in the elevator. Disinfect their hands upon leaving the elevator.

Outside, in the open air, you are safe as long as you stay away from other people. Keep your masks on even if you are sound and exhibit no symptoms.

What else can you do?

Quit hoping for a miracle: “maybe I am going to get lucky…” Instead PREPARE YOUR BODIES FOR THE ONSET OF THE INFECTION.

If your system is rested, well hydrated, adequately nourished, and you get enough sleep, vitamins and electrolytes and your comorbid conditions are under control, your body is going to handle the infection much better, and it will recover even from a severe pneumonia.

Do the following:

1. REMEMBER TO HYDRATE YOUR SYSTEM ADEQUATELY: DRINK ABOUT 10-15 GLASSES OF WATER a day. Avoid cold and hot water; drink lukewarm water. Calculate your daily demand for water intake using online calculators.
2. Stock on fever-reducing and anti-inflammatory medications but don’t buy out the whole pharmacy: two packets of each will do. Pharmacies will stay open. Add vitamins to your diet; eat washed and scalded (but not cooked) vegetables and fruit, preferably kiwi and citrus fruits (mind the sugar content in the fruit). Take vitamin D. On a regular basis, take natural probiotics: kefir, yoghurt, sour milk, pickled food.
3. Quit alcohol for 3 up to 4 weeks (a small glass of wine to go with dinner at most) in order not to dehydrate your system. By all means avoid intoxication. Your hangover is a result of alcohol poisoning: it involves dehydration, electrolyte imbalance, heightened risk of heart attack, brain stroke as well as thrombosis or compromised immunity.
4. Quit smoking (COVID-19 will attack your lungs). If you have to smoke, bring it down to 2-3 electronic cigarettes a day, with no tar.
5. Reduce the amount of liquids that include caffeine: don’t drink more than 1 coffee and 1 strong tea a day. Caffeine, theine and guaranine – as recent research has proved – are the same substance from a chemical point of view. Caffeine, which is a methylxanthine, stimulates the expression of vasopressins, which in turn is responsible for water depletion (dehydration). If you drink a lot coffee and tea, make sure to replenish your potassium and magnesium.
6. Every day do a simple work-out for 5-10 minutes. It is best to consult a professional trainer from your gym. Those guys have no jobs at the moment so try Skyping them. Over the course of the next two months avoid physical and psychological strain.
7. Work by day and sleep by night. Have 8 hours of sleep; what really matters is that you sleep over the midnight to 3:00 am time span. No sleep during this time span may lead to a heightened risk of high blood pressure and then to a heart attack or a brain stroke. It has been proved that shift work increases the risk of breast cancer in women so working by night probably compromises your immunity.
8. Prepare your body for the onset of the infection as best as you can. Remember that a clamping feeling in your chest may be connected with stress but also with a heart disease. Remember that in COVID-19 it is a late symptom (not the first one). Keep calm. The sensation of suffocation which disappears when you change your posture is probably associated with discopathy and chest muscle tension.
9. DEVELOP, WELL IN ADVANCE, EFFECTIVE TECHNIQUES FOR RELAXATION so that you can calm yourself down when the going gets tough. If you suffer from depression or neurosis, stock up on medications and stay in touch (online) with your therapist. Contact them and ask them to see you via Skype, Zoom or Messenger.
10. Prepare A SIMPLE BREATHING DEVICE at home. It is for breathing exercises in case of pneumonia. The simplest breathing device may be made of a 1 litre (two pints) plastic bottle which contained mineral water (soda). Fill it up to ¾ capacity with water and screw the cap. In the cap, make a hole that will accommodate a straw/tube. In case of pneumonia, breath into the straw/tube: 10 expirations per hour. It is a challenge for a healthy person, not to mention for a suffering one. But the sooner you learn this, the better. Teach this technique to elderly persons and explain the rationale (TO DECOMPRESS YOUR LUNGS).
11. Hospitals will not accommodate each of us. County hospitals have as many as 20-30 beds in intensive care units while we may need upwards of 2000-3000… This means that, come the worst-case scenario, one in a hundred people will be treated in those units. So do your best not to fall seriously ill, and don’t ignore your early symptoms.
12. Start reducing your fever when it reaches 38,6 C: until 38,5 C let your system fight it. In those temperatures the enzymatic complexes in leucocytes are particularly active. This does not apply to exceptional cases: people with anergy (“I never have a high temperature”) or fever-induced convulsions in your medical history.
13. Don’t forget your medications for your chronic conditions: you can’t miss them during the onset of the COVID-19 infection. Make sure you can contact a medical practitioner who will come to your parents in case of infection and drip feed them with hydrates if the hospitals have reached their capacity.

Dear friends,

everything comes to pass, no matter how dangerous the beast. Take care of yourselves and your nearest and dearest. Don’t panic. Be prepared. This is going to begin in about a week and it may last 2-3 months before it calms down.

We have to LEARN HOW TO LIVE WITH COVID-19 right behind our backs. We have to learn from scratch how to approach the issue of hygiene: wash not only your hands but also your food and even your shopping, which somebody might have sneezed or coughed upon!

At the same time, we must avoid bacteriophobia, i.e. a pathological fear of germs. To combat the enemy, we need to learn its language. Its language is particularly difficult because it is a medical language but it has some advantages: you can find all about it on the internet and many medical practitioners do their best to translate it from the medical into Polish/English on their profiles and websites.

Good luck and hold on tight because it is going to get rough. We still have about a week till the storm reaches us. Make your boats sea-worthy and prepare your crew for this storm. We don’t know how big it is going to be because we are in an information fog. Perhaps it will prove to be a storm in a teacup but it is more likely that we are going to get hit pretty hard.”

Maciej Jedrzejko, MD / Translation to english: Prof dr hab. n.hum Leszk Drong