Every day, unbeknownst to you, you encounter potential invaders who want to move in and make you their home! As you’re exposed to germs and toxins throughout your day – hidden bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites (also known as pathogens) – your body is quietly going about its business of keeping you safe. It’s comforting to know that you’re never fighting life alone – you have a whole host of internal soldiers on your side, in the form of your immune system.
Your immune system is your body’s own personal defence force. Its duty is to serve and protect you from infection, illness and disease; to guard against all who threaten you – both external and internal. Without it, quite simply, you would die.
Enlisted are a vast and powerful army of cells, tissues and organs that have different roles and responsibilities in battle. When they detect any threat to your health, they coordinate their defences to protect you. The efforts of your immune system won’t always stop you from getting sick, though – but that’s not its main mission. Rather, it’s to stop a threat from escalating to dangerous levels inside your body and to help you recover after an injury or illness.
Your immune system is engaged in constant surveillance. It keeps a record of every microbe it has ever defeated in its memory cells so that if one comes back, it remembers them and knows just what to do!
Quickly, it identifies and destroys a returning invader if it re-enters your body, before it can spread and affect you more severely. An example of this is chicken pox or measles – being infected by these viruses once is usually enough to protect you for life. This memory mechanism helps us develop long term immunity.
So, in fact, germs aren’t all bad – you need them to stay healthy! And getting sick from time to time ensures that you maintain a robust immune system.
However, some infections, like the common cold or flu, have to be fought many times because many different viruses or strains can cause these illnesses. In these cases, catching one does not give you immunity against others.
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