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The art of preventing flu
Hello,
Our 3-year old daughter brings heavy-duty flu germs from the kindergarten on a regular basis and everyone in the house gets it, including her 2-months old little brother. We'd like our daughter to start an echinacea program in order to strenghten her immune system. Little Flintstones vitamins with aspartame flavoring do no good... yes sweetie, take the red pill... What's the best way to give echinacea to a 3-year old ? As for myself, I take echinacea in liquid form added to orange juice, but the taste is a bit weird and I doubt I'll convince Little One to drink it. Thanks. P. |
#2
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The art of preventing flu
"Parker T." wrote in message
om... Hello, Our 3-year old daughter brings heavy-duty flu germs from the kindergarten on a regular basis and everyone in the house gets it, including her 2-months old little brother. Sounds more like run-of-the-mill, "common" *colds*. (This--about now through next spring--would be your son's first flu season; the first confirmed case was just reported in our area last week.) You really do want to prevent him from contracting "true" flu (influenza); it's bad enough in healthy adults and older children. We'd like our daughter to start an echinacea program in order to strenghten her immune system. Little Flintstones vitamins with aspartame flavoring do no good... yes sweetie, take the red pill... Actually, a good supplemental multivitamin/mineral tablet probably does as much, if not more, to support the immune system than does echinacea. Make sure, of course, that your daughter is getting a balanced diet and plenty of rest/sleep, and institute and rigorously enforce, if you haven't already, a policy of washing hands (*everyone* in the household) EVERY time you enter the house. If your daughter is repeatedly bringing home viruses, I'd start playing hardball with the kindergarten personnel. Tell them the rate of illness within their facility is appalling and unacceptable, and ask them to strictly enforce their health policies. (Every school/daycare center with which I'm familiar has such policies; e.g., no school until a feverish child has had a normal temperature for 24 continuous hours; no school if there's been diarrhea/vomiting in the last 24 hours.) No doubt they'll tell you they're doing what they can ("We're trying"), but obviously they AREN'T doing enough. Ask them if they've noticed repeated policy violators and how they've dealt with them. Ask them if they'd like *you* (you might be able to recruit other ****ed-off-at-the-rate-of-illness parents to help) to confront the repeated offenders. But I digress...:-) What's the best way to give echinacea to a 3-year old ? As for myself, I take echinacea in liquid form added to orange juice, but the taste is a bit weird and I doubt I'll convince Little One to drink it. When my daughter was younger, we gave her supplements made by Herbs for Kids. The company, based in MT, has a variety of formulas intended to support kids' immune systems (go to http://www.herbsforkids.com/products.asp?pcid=9). We used to add drops of their "Sweet Echinacea" to a peppermint/chamomile tea blend. (She drank it, so I guess it wasn't TOO nasty!) There's a "store locator" feature on the Herbs for Kids site; it doesn't appear to have info for every state, though. (I'm in CO and have found their products in various store here, yet no retailers are listed for CO.) Good luck! JG ...I have no affiliation whatsoever with Herbs for Kids (aside from being a previous consumer of their products), and I can't testify to their products' effectiveness. I don't know which measure, or combination of measures, kept my daughter (relatively) healthy. I do believe, however, that Herbs for Kids products are safe when taken as recommended. |
#3
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The art of preventing flu
"Parker T." wrote in message om... Hello, Our 3-year old daughter brings heavy-duty flu germs from the kindergarten on a regular basis and everyone in the house gets it, including her 2-months old little brother. .... The best way to prevent flu is to wash hands... teach the little ones to wash their hands. |
#4
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The art of preventing flu
"JG" wrote in message t...
If your daughter is repeatedly bringing home viruses, I'd start playing hardball with the kindergarten personnel. Tell them the rate of illness within their facility is appalling and unacceptable, and ask them to strictly enforce their health policies. (Every school/daycare center with which I'm familiar has such policies; e.g., no school until a feverish child has had a normal temperature for 24 continuous hours; no school if there's been diarrhea/vomiting in the last 24 hours.) No doubt they'll tell you they're doing what they can ("We're trying"), but obviously they AREN'T doing enough. Ask them if they've noticed repeated policy violators and how they've dealt with them. Ask them if they'd like *you* (you might be able to recruit other ****ed-off-at-the-rate-of-illness parents to help) to confront the repeated offenders. But I digress...:-) I generally agree with your post, but if the kinds of illnesses being brought home are cold-type viruses, I'm not sure that the kinds of policies you mention will prevent spread. It's my understanding that these viruses are frequently contagious before there are symptoms, and different children can display symptoms of different levels of severity, so one kid may not get too sick and thus be well within the guidelines but may transmit a cold to five kids who all get sicker than that first kid. My child's day care has the policies you mention, and they're very strict (I've taken my child to the doctor twice this week to rule out possible contagious illnesses even though nobody involved REALLY thought he had anything contagious) and colds are still ubiquitous there. If the OP is using 'flu' in the stomach bug sense (boy, I wish English didn't have that conflation, it just confuses the heck out of people) I agree that they're not trying hard enough at her school. FWIW, there seems to be a general feeling that this is a worse-than- average year for viruses so far, but every year may seem that way in a sort of reverse Lake Woebegon effect so I'm not sure how much weight it has. Beth |
#5
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The art of preventing flu
"Parker T." wrote in message om... Hello, Our 3-year old daughter brings heavy-duty flu germs from the kindergarten on a regular basis and everyone in the house gets it, including her 2-months old little brother. .... The best way to prevent flu is to wash hands... teach the little ones to wash their hands. |
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The art of preventing flu
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#7
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The art of preventing flu
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#8
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The art of preventing flu
On Mon, 10 Nov 2003 18:46:25 -0700, Tsu Dho Nimh
wrote: (Parker T.) wrote: We'd like our daughter to start an echinacea program in order to strenghten her immune system. What part of the immune system are you hoping to strengthen? The macrophages? IgG production? T-cell count? Mast cells? Now, be nice... PF |
#9
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The art of preventing flu
"JG" wrote in message t...
"Parker T." wrote in message om... Hello, Our 3-year old daughter brings heavy-duty flu germs from the kindergarten on a regular basis and everyone in the house gets it, including her 2-months old little brother. Sounds more like run-of-the-mill, "common" *colds*. (This--about now through next spring--would be your son's first flu season; the first confirmed case was just reported in our area last week.) You really do want to prevent him from contracting "true" flu (influenza); it's bad enough in healthy adults and older children. We'd like our daughter to start an echinacea program in order to strenghten her immune system. Little Flintstones vitamins with aspartame flavoring do no good... yes sweetie, take the red pill... Actually, a good supplemental multivitamin/mineral tablet probably does as much, if not more, to support the immune system than does echinacea. Make sure, of course, that your daughter is getting a balanced diet and plenty of rest/sleep, and institute and rigorously enforce, if you haven't already, a policy of washing hands (*everyone* in the household) EVERY time you enter the house. If your daughter is repeatedly bringing home viruses, I'd start playing hardball with the kindergarten personnel. Tell them the rate of illness within their facility is appalling and unacceptable, and ask them to strictly enforce their health policies. (Every school/daycare center with which I'm familiar has such policies; e.g., no school until a feverish child has had a normal temperature for 24 continuous hours; no school if there's been diarrhea/vomiting in the last 24 hours.) No doubt they'll tell you they're doing what they can ("We're trying"), but obviously they AREN'T doing enough. Ask them if they've noticed repeated policy violators and how they've dealt with them. Ask them if they'd like *you* (you might be able to recruit other ****ed-off-at-the-rate-of-illness parents to help) to confront the repeated offenders. But I digress...:-) What's the best way to give echinacea to a 3-year old ? As for myself, I take echinacea in liquid form added to orange juice, but the taste is a bit weird and I doubt I'll convince Little One to drink it. When my daughter was younger, we gave her supplements made by Herbs for Kids. The company, based in MT, has a variety of formulas intended to support kids' immune systems (go to http://www.herbsforkids.com/products.asp?pcid=9). We used to add drops of their "Sweet Echinacea" to a peppermint/chamomile tea blend. (She drank it, so I guess it wasn't TOO nasty!) There's a "store locator" feature on the Herbs for Kids site; it doesn't appear to have info for every state, though. (I'm in CO and have found their products in various store here, yet no retailers are listed for CO.) Good luck! JG ...I have no affiliation whatsoever with Herbs for Kids (aside from being a previous consumer of their products), and I can't testify to their products' effectiveness. I don't know which measure, or combination of measures, kept my daughter (relatively) healthy. I do believe, however, that Herbs for Kids products are safe when taken as recommended. Thanks for all the information, it's appreciated. I found yesterday some chewable orange-flavored echinacea tablets for kids, and Little One does like them. Great marketing tool: they put in smiley on the tablet, so kids perceive them as treats. Also, I agree with previous postings and washing hands right after kindergarten should be done on a very strict basis. Thanks, P. |
#10
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The art of preventing flu
Tsu Dho Nimh wrote in message . ..
(Elizabeth Reid) wrote: I generally agree with your post, but if the kinds of illnesses being brought home are cold-type viruses, I'm not sure that the kinds of policies you mention will prevent spread. Handwashing - on arrival, before lunch, and before going home - caused a huge (30-40%) drop in the number of days absent on some schools. My child's day care has recently started enforcing this (the handwashing on arrival thing, they've always done handwashing before any food) and I devoutly hope that it's going to make a difference, but I have to say I'm not sure I understand why it would. If my child's got a runny nose, he's going to touch it about 1.2 nanoseconds after I wash his hands and be all ready to give it to the other kids. So this is an empirical result? What age groups were looked at? I'm a compulsive hand washer myself, and I do wash my child's hands after we're out in any environment where he's touching things lots of other people have touched, but I'm not sure I can picture why the handwashing on arrival makes such a difference when he's going to be around the same kids all day and being exposed to whatever they have. If it helps, though, I'm all for it. Beth |
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