Festival flu can encompass a range of illnesses from simple summer colds to more serious infections like bronchitis. Sometimes, festival flu isn’t caused by a virus or bacteria, but by environment and activity. According to Dr. Cedric “Jamie” Rutland, a pulmonary and critical care medicine physician and spokesperson for the Lung Association, “It’s usually not a specific illness but a combination of lack of sleep, lack of nutrition screaming, shouting and dehydration.”

The symptoms are as you’d expect: coughing, sneezing, nasal congestion, and watery eyes, and can also include more troublesome symptoms like body aches and fever. Not the way one wants to spend their sunny summer days and nights! 

So, how can you prevent “festival flu”? Here are five tips for staying healthy throughout the summer gathering season:

Start with self-care. When it comes to illness, often the best defense is a good offense. Prioritizing your health on the days you aren’t socializing can go a long way toward helping your body mount its best defense against “festival flu” on the days you are. Both lack of sleep and poor nutrition can have a negative impact on your immune function, while exercise is an immune booster! If you have a busy summer ahead, incorporating healthy habits like proper sleep (7-8 hours per night), regular exercise (30 minutes, 3-5 times per week), and a healthy diet with plentiful fruits and veggies can help ensure your body is functioning at its best when you do encounter environments that put your immune system to the test!  

Supplement ahead of time. While maintaining healthy habits can go a long way toward keeping you well, targeted supplementation provides extra, much-needed protection for your respiratory system. And don’t wait until the day-of! Be proactive in making respiratory support part of your daily routine during the summer months and get ahead of the season’s plethora of allergies and irritants. Quercetin and other bioflavonoids, like those found in BreatheClear with NTFactor®, are key ingredients in reducing inflammation and your body’s allergic response. Quercetin helps to open respiratory passages and reduce sinus congestion, while also lowering the body’s response to histamine to reduce the inflammatory cascade that causes so many of our troubling allergy symptoms. The inclusion of the patented NTFactor lipid blend also fights fatigue naturally by targeting its source: your mitochondria! By providing vital lipids to help maintain your mitochondrial membrane, BreatheClear helps your body generate energy more efficiently, so you can enjoy your summer activities to the fullest! 

Drink up! (No, not like that.) It should go without saying that it’s important to stay hydrated if you’re outside in the summer heat, but quenching your thirst at the beer tent or soda stand can actually have a detrimental effect on your hydration. Both alcohol and caffeine can result in dehydration—especially if you’re already sweating in the sun! Stick with water or electrolyte-laden sports drinks to replenish your body. Not only will staying hydrated help prevent overheating, it also keeps your throat and nasal passages from drying out, and helps replenish the mucus you need to trap and clear inhaled irritants and invaders.

Wash your hands. While proper handwashing (lathering up for at least thirty seconds with soap and warm water) isn’t always an option at outdoor events, it’s still important to keep your hands clean. Hand sanitizer should be amongst your festival essentials—many brands even offer small bottles or cases with clips that attach easily onto a purse or belt loop, so it’s always available when you need to de-germ. And remember, not all sanitizers are created equal; make sure your brand of choice is at least 60% alcohol.

Avoid environmental irritants. This can be one of the hardest factors to control, especially at outdoor venues where folks are more likely to smoke and environmental irritants like pollen abound. Try to choose a spot where you can avoid inhaling others’ smoke—and smoking yourself—as much as possible. Smoke can aggravate and dry out delicate respiratory tissue, making you more vulnerable to coughs even if you don’t have existing respiratory concerns. If you suffer from asthma or allergies, breathing in smoke can be even more dangerous.

Keeping these tips in mind should help you avoid the dreaded “festival flu” this summer, but if you do happen to come down with an illness, be sure to take time to rest and recover. Continue to prioritize your rest, hydration, and nutrition while you recuperate, and consult your physician if symptoms don’t improve or last longer than a week. Fight the temptation to resume your summer fun before you’re feeling fully recovered, both for your own sake (your immune system needs a chance to recharge before you expose yourself to another concert or festival) and for the sake of others (after all, someone passed that festival flu to you!).

What are free radicals?

Free radicals are highly unstable molecules that cause “oxidative stress,” a process that can trigger cell damage and is thought to contribute to health issues ranging from cardiovascular disease and diabetes, to cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and even cataracts. And what’s worse—the negative effects of free radicals seem to increase as we age.

Can we prevent exposure to free radicals? Not entirely. In fact, we are the main source of the free radicals that disrupt our lives! Free radicals are naturally created in the body when we do everyday things like exercise or convert food into energy. Furthermore, environmental factors such as cigarette smoke, air pollution (like all that wildfire smoke), and even sun exposure can create stress that generates additional free radicals.

Thankfully, we have a powerful tool to fight their effects!

How antioxidants protect our cells

With air quality shifting day by day, there’s no better time to increase our consumption of antioxidants—substances that protect our cells from the damage caused by free radicals.

Antioxidants can be natural or man-made. Our bodies have the ability to produce powerful antioxidants such as glutathione, catalase, and many others that fight the stress that generates free radicals. Unfortunately, our ability to create these antioxidants weakens with age, and as it does, the membranes of our bodies—including vital cell and mitochondrial membranes—can suffer damage. Damage to these membranes leads to weakening of the systems that help us produce energy, as well as our immune systems. This helps explain why fatigue is one of the top complaints of patients to their physicians!

You already get some antioxidants from your diet—vitamins E and C, carotenoids (like beta-carotene), lutein, lycopene, and zeaxanthin. If you have not already, introduce antioxidant-rich foods including berries like goji, blueberries, and strawberries, green leafy vegetables like kale and spinach, and even delicious dark chocolate to your diet!

But for most of us, our diet doesn’t provide us with the optimal amount of antioxidants to protect our bodies from free radical damage—that’s where high-quality supplements that can provide Membrane Lipid Replacement (MLR) come in.

The power of Membrane Lipid Replacement

Where your diet ends, the benefits of MLR continue!

Oxidative stress results in part from the damage that free radicals cause to the health of our mitochondrial membranes. When these membranes are damaged, they are less equipped to utilize oxygen, which can lead to feelings of fatigue. When we are young, the amount of antioxidant benefits produced in our cells exceeds the damage done by the free radicals we produce. That equation naturally changes in adulthood and is accelerated by illness, consumption of unhealthy foods, nicotine, excessive alcohol, and other factors. This is evidenced by the overwhelming complaint of fatigue in doctor’s offices.

Unfortunately, antioxidants alone cannot repair the damage to cell membranes.

For that, you need something more powerful: Membrane Lipid Replacement (MLR). MLR is the use of natural, protected membrane lipid supplements exclusively from plant sources to safely replace damaged, oxidized lipids in cellular membranes in order to restore membrane function, decrease various symptoms and improve health. The only ingredient proven so far to effect MLR is NTFactor®, an ingredient patented and provided by Nutritional Therapeutics, Inc. By itself, it restores energy and undoes the damage to membranes caused by free radicals. When used with other supplements, it improves the benefits of those ingredients.

Clinical studies have demonstrated the advantages of MLR in restoring membrane and organelle function and reducing fatigue, pain and other symptoms in chronic illnesses and aging patients. In animal studies it has shown the ability to reduce free radicals while increasing cell motility and resistance to oxidative damage.

BreatheClear with NTFactor®

BreatheClear with NTFactor® combines the benefits of MLR from NTFactor® Lipids with quercetin, a powerful bioflavonoid (a type of antioxidant found in foods containing vitamin C). In addition to its antioxidant properties, quercetin is an anti-inflammatory and works to open up the nasal and respiratory passages, thereby making it easier to breathe and reduce sinus problems. A must-have in these days where a rogue weather pattern can shift harmful air our way, and a good staple to have on hand for any time the air is full of irritants, whether they be manmade or as common as seasonal pollen.

To give your BreatheClear a boost, combine it with our pure NTFactor® Lipids Powder and provide your body with more of the cell-repairing power of Membrane Lipid Replacement! Right now, we’re offering limited-time savings by bundling these two products together! When you shop the bundle, you can choose either size of Lipids Powder (75g or 150g) and receive a FREE bottle of BreatheClear (a $27.49 value!).

As wildfire season seems to expand every year, there’s no better time to arm yourself with the protective power of BreatheClear combined with NTFactor® Lipids Powder, and breathe freely while supporting your body’s fight against free radicals!

References

For antioxidants:

NIH:    https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/antioxidants-in-depth

For MLR:

Seidman, MD. NT Factor® Spares the Age-Related loss of Nerve Function, Energy and Genetic damage in animals. (2002). Otolaryngology- Head and Neck Surgery, 127, pp.138-143.
Approved and supervised by Henry Ford Hosp. IACUC group
# 9 on bibliography at NTFactor.com/research

Agadjanyan, M., et al. Nutritional supplement (NTFactor) restores mitochondrial function and reduces moderately severe fatigue in aged subjects. J. Chronic Fatigue Syndr. 11(3): 23-36 (2003).
# 12 on bibliography

Why do allergies make you feel fatigued?

1. Immune Response. During allergy season, your immune system is in an almost constant state of overdrive as it works to fight off allergens. When allergens are introduced into your body, the immune system reacts by creating large amounts of histamine to fight off the invaders. The more constant the exposure, the more relentlessly your body works to repel the threat.  
2. Inflammation. When the histamine released into your system reacts to fight off allergens, it causes inflammation throughout your body. Inflammation is most often the result of oxidative stress on your cells. Your cells are the source of energy in your body, so when they aren’t functioning properly, you become fatigued.
3. Sleep disruption. When we don’t get a good night’s sleep, we feel drained for most of the day. Allergies can cause sleep troubles in several ways. While we’re sleeping, a stuffy or runny nose, coughing, and throat clearing will disturb a good night’s rest. That is, if you can get to sleep at all! Plus, allergies can worsen existing sleep conditions, such as apnea. Getting a proper diagnosis for any sleep disorders is key to fighting off allergy fatigue.
4. Sinus Pressure. People with allergies often talk about having brain fog. Pressure build-up in your sinus cavities may be one reason. Allergy sufferers can be so focused on the pain and pressure in their heads that it becomes hard to concentrate on even some basic tasks.

How can you fight allergy fatigue?

1. Work with your doctor. The first step in combating your allergies is a proper diagnosis of your allergies by an allergist. Knowing what you’re allergic to is most of the battle. Working with your doctor, you can come up with a plan of treatment to relieve many of your symptoms. Your doctor can prescribe medication or suggest over-the-counter allergy products. When picking over-the-counter medicines, your best option is to choose non-drowsy formulas.
2. Clean your indoor environment. Using air purifiers is another great tool. Reducing your exposure to allergy triggers is key to alleviating your symptoms. Using a purifier with a good quality filter will help reduce the amount of airborne allergens circulating. Keep the purifier by your favorite seat, close to your bed, or near the source of the allergens.
3. Clean your body. Showering before bed can help with sleep. Not only can a hot shower be relaxing, it also aids in opening your sinuses. Plus, it washes away any allergens clinging to your skin or hair.
4. Get the support of BreatheClear® with NTFactor®. BreatheClear with NTFactor® contains both quercetin and bioflavonoids, key ingredients in the reduction of allergy inflammation and reaction*. It was specifically designed to work on the inflammation and symptoms of environmental allergies and asthma*. And as with all NTFactor® products, it contains our patented NTFactor® Lipids, which have been proven to repair and replace damaged cell membranes, helping to optimize cell function and increase energy naturally.

Breathe easier this allergy season and fight allergic fatigue with BreatheClear with NTFactor®.

A: There are a myriad of reasons for low energy. Here are some obvious ones:

Are you getting enough sleep? Most adults require six to eight hours of sleep every night. Do you snore or have sleep apnea? This will cause sleep disruption and may lead to high blood pressure.

Were you diagnosed with low iron or anemia? Low energy and fatigue are common complaints among those with anemia. Even if you don’t have iron-deficiency anemia, you may have low ferritin which is the storage form of iron. Best to get this checked. You want your ferritin level around 70 – 90 ng/ml.

Do you have low B12 levels? Best to shoot for the 600 – 900 pg/ml range. Check your vitamin D too since low levels can contribute to fatigue as well. Shoot for ranges over 50 ng/dl.

An adrenal function test via saliva testing (as opposed to a blood test) will reveal if your adrenals are stressed or exhausted—a common reason for low energy.

Have you had your thyroid checked? Hypothyroidism is a primary reason for low energy as well as dry skin, constipation, hair loss, and depression. If you’re currently taking thyroid replacement, best to have your thyroid hormone levels checked every six months to ensure your dose doesn’t require tweaking.

Blood sugar imbalances can cause fluctuations in energy since it’s a common symptom of both high and low blood sugar. A five-hour glucose tolerance test with insulin is the gold standard to assess this.

Barring all of the above, food allergies or intolerances and looking for toxic exposures and assessing how well your detox pathways are functioning will be key to uncovering the cause of low energy.

Helpful supplements to give your energy a boost include CoQ10 and NTFactor®. In fact, NTFactor® is clinically proven to reduce fatigue significantly, no matter what the cause.

An assessment by a nutritionally oriented practitioner can help you uncover the cause(s) of low energy and recommend appropriate therapies for you.

To your health! 

Leyla Muedin, MS, RD, CDN 

All of these can make you feel more tired—but how do you know if what you’re feeling is simple tiredness or true fatigue? There is a big difference, and it matters! Knowing what you’re experiencing will help you take actions to feel better.

The short answer: If it can be solved by a long nap (or a concerted effort to improve your sleep hygiene), you’re probably just tired. If no amount of rest can bring you relief, you’re probably experiencing fatigue.

We’re all familiar with the effects of too little rest: A brain fog that makes us more forgetful, muscle weakness that makes our daily workout feel like it requires extra effort, impatience that has us snapping at usually tolerable irritations. But despite all that, we still have the energy to get through our everyday tasks and our symptoms can usually be relieved with a good night’s rest.

Fatigue is more pervasive. While all the symptoms above are temporary, if you’re fatigued, you’ll probably find your symptoms linger even when you’re logging eight hours of Zzzz’s per night. Some may seem similar to the effects of tiredness—inability to concentrate and decreased stamina are common with fatigue and can mirror the forgetfulness and weakness mentioned above. However, those experiencing fatigue are also more likely to suffer from troublesome symptoms like anxiety, difficulty sleeping, and an urge to withdraw and be asocial. (After all, who wants to socialize when they’re feeling depleted?)  Some even report sensitivity to light. These symptoms can make it hard to get through the day, and when they linger they can have a significant negative impact on your life.

There are a number of physiological reasons we experience fatigue, and in order to rid ourselves of that pervasive feeling of exhaustion, we have to identify the source. Remember, while fatigue itself can feel miserable, it’s often a symptom of other primary health concerns.

According to Dr. Garth Nicolson, our resident science advisor, “If the fatigue is related to a particular medical concern, then alleviating that concern might reduce the fatigue.  If it is related to over-exertion, then removing the exertion and taking time to rest can reduce the fatigue. If fatigue is related to damage to cell membranes, mostly in the mitochondria, the little batteries inside all of our cells, then replacing damaged molecules or correcting the defect can reduce the fatigue.”

While tiredness can be resolved by simply giving your body a chance to get a good night’s rest, tackling fatigue requires more nuanced management. Talk to your doctor about how you’re feeling, and they can help you identify any underlying medical causes and provide appropriate treatment options if needed.  However, if there’s no clear cause for your fatigue, you may be experiencing fatigue on a cellular level.

Most fatigue—especially fatigue that’s long-lasting, or chronic fatigue (defined by unrelenting fatigue that has existed for six months or more)—can be associated with damage to our cell membranes, often caused by oxidative stress or chemical reactions as we age. When membranes—especially mitochondrial membranes—are damaged, it impairs our body’s ability to transmit the chemical signals and produce the high-energy molecules like ATP that power our cells. The result is that mitochondrial and cell function are decreased. Optimal mitochondrial function is important because these “powerhouses” within our body are where food is converted to usable energy.

Dr. Nicolson elaborates, “Normally the damaged mitochondrial membrane phospholipids are repaired or replaced, but in some cases (particularly with aging), this often doesn’t occur fast or often enough to repair and return mitochondria to their full capabilities of producing high-energy molecules like ATP.”

One particularly sensitive part of the mitochondrial membrane is its phospholipid matrix in the mitochondrial inner membrane, which can be damaged by exposure to free-radical oxidants—something we experience as part of our everyday lives, because these free radials are generated by everything from exercise and infection to simple aging.

So, what can we do?

We can give our cells a boost by helping to replace and fortify that sensitive lipid matrix. While we glean a certain amount of phospholipids from our diet (and even from supplements like fish oil), they’re not always the exact mix our body needs, and they can often suffer damage during the digestion process before our bodies are able to put them to use.

“Although natural food sources are good, they can’t supply enough of these critical molecules, even if you consumed industrial quantities of certain foods,” Dr. Nicolson explains. “NTFactor® Lipids are protected from natural oxidative damage that occurs all the time, and the mix of membrane phospholipids carefully matches the needed replacement molecules for mitochondria, especially the mitochondrial inner membrane.”

NTFactor® Lipids provides your body with a proprietary lipid blend that allows it to rebuild and repair those vital membranes and get those chemical signals hopping at the quick and efficient rate that helps to fuel everything from your morning workout to chasing after your kids in the afternoon.

When a good night’s sleep just isn’t enough, treat your cells to the restorative powers of NTFactor® and NTFactor® Lipids.

References

Nicolson GL, Ash ME.  Membrane Lipid Replacement for chronic illnesses, aging and cancer using oral glycerolphospholipid formulations with fructooligosaccharides to restore phospholipid function in cellular membranes, organelles, cells and tissues. Biochimica et Biophysica Acta Biomembranes 2017; 1859: 1704-1724.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bbamem.2017.04.013

Nicolson GL. Membrane Lipid Replacement—a functional approach to repairing cellular membranes, reducing symptoms,  and restoring function.  Functional Food Science 2022; 2(8): 198-204. 
https://doi.org/10.31989/ffs.v2i8.990

Nicolson GL, Ferreira de Mattos G, Settineri R, Breeding PC. Membrane Lipid Replacement and its role in restoring mitochondrial membrane function and reducing symptoms in aging and age-related clinical conditions.  Nature Cell Science 2024; 2(4): 238-256.
https://doi.org/10.61474/ncs.2024.00038

Mitochondria are the little batteries inside each of our cells that provide almost all of our energy needs. When mitochondria become damaged due to natural aging, chronic illness, infection, chemical contamination, and other events, they no longer provide enough energy to our cells to maintain various functions. This can result in increases in fatigue, pain, and many other symptoms that are linked to cellular energy. During disease and as we age, there is an increase in damage to our cells—especially our mitochondria—from highly reactive molecules called free radicals that are derived from mitochondria themselves and from other sources. These free radicals cause ‘oxidative stress’ and react with and damage our mitochondrial membranes as well as other cellular membranes, and can even modify our genetic code (DNA).  

The phospholipids in our cell membranes are among the most sensitive molecules in our cells to free radicals. These phospholipids naturally form a bilayer structure that is the matrix of all the membranes in each cell and every cell in our bodies. The damaged membrane phospholipids, especially those in our mitochondrial inner membranes, must be replaced continually to maintain the fluidity, structural integrity and activities of cellular membranes as well as maintaining their trans-membrane electrical/chemical gradients necessary for production of high-energy molecules like ATP. 

At Nutritional Therapeutics, we have been working on repairing mitochondria and returning their function back to normal using all-natural food supplements. What we have found is that one of the most common causes for mitochondrial dysfunction and resulting fatigue is damage to their membrane lipids and resultant leaky membranes that cannot maintain proper electrical/chemical gradients inside mitochondria. We have also found that natural membrane lipid supplements like NTFactor Lipids® can replace the damaged mitochondrial lipids and restore mitochondrial membranes and mitochondrial function. This results in increased production of the powerhouse molecule ATP, which drives almost all cellular activities and has many benefits, the most obvious of which is increased energy.

So, if you’re suffering from fatigue, you might want to try Membrane Lipid Replacement with NTFactor Lipids®. This all-natural supplement repairs damage to the energy-producing structures or mitochondria inside all of our cells and can significantly reduce fatigue and increase vitality and stamina. 

Prof. Emeritus Garth Nicolson, PhD, MD (H) 
The Institute for Molecular Medicine
Huntington Beach, California

References

Nicolson GL. Membrane Lipid Replacement—a functional approach to repairing cellular membranes, reducing symptoms,  and restoring function.  Functional Food Science 2022; 2(8): 198-204. 
https://doi.org/10.31989/ffs.v2i8.990

Nicolson GL, Ferreira de Mattos G, Settineri R, Breeding PC. Membrane Lipid Replacement and its role in restoring mitochondrial membrane function and reducing symptoms in aging and age-related clinical conditions.  Nature Cell Science 2024; 2(4): 238-256.
https://doi.org/10.61474/ncs.2024.00038