How to strengthen infant immunity?

Parents do their best to ensure their babies do not get sick, asking physicians many questions ranging from vitamin supplements to nutrition programs.

There are many ways to strengthen infant immunity and ensure they are protected from diseases.

These ways can be listed as follows:

Breast milk: Defense system soldiers called antibodies pass to babies from their mothers through the placenta and protect them against various diseases until they are about 6 months old. Subsequent protection is provided by the antibodies that babies receive through breast milk.

“Immunoglobulin A” found in breast milk is important for immunity and protection against diseases. Furthermore, another breast milk component called “lactoferrin” prevents the proliferation of bacteria that need iron to develop by binding the iron. Another important component is the prebiotic content of breast milk.

Prebiotics in breast milk support the development of beneficial bacteria called “Bifidobacterium bifidum” found in the infant's gut. Thus, they settle in the infant's gut and prevent potentially disease-causing bacteria. There is extensive information about breast milk, even if one were to write only about its effect on immunity. Many scientific studies on this subject are still ongoing. It is necessary to feed babies with breast milk as much as possible for the first 6 months.

Mothers and fathers should not smoke: There are more than 4,000 chemical components in cigarette smoke. Among these chemicals, nicotine and carbon monoxide, in particular, cause narrowing in the vessels of the uterus, blood, and umbilical cord where the baby resides during pregnancy.

In this situation, which results in a decrease in nutrient and gas exchange between the baby and the mother, the fetus is malnourished, and developmental delays, allergies, asthma, middle ear infections, and immune system problems may develop in the baby in later years.

Probiotic intake should be increased in infant nutrition: A probiotic can be briefly defined as “microorganisms that positively affect health when taken in certain amounts.” Probiotics that we can also use in children are mainly found in yogurt, cheese, kefir, and pickles. These fermented foods contain Lactobacilli, Bifidobacteria, and many other microorganisms with probiotic properties.

In addition to probiotics, prebiotic foods should also be included in the diet: Although they sound similar, unlike probiotics, prebiotics are non-digestible carbohydrate group food components that positively affect human health by supporting the increase of beneficial bacteria with probiotic properties living in the large intestine.

There are four main groups of prebiotics:

Inulin, fructooligosaccharides (FOS), lactulose (LOZ), and galactooligosaccharides (GOS). Foods with prebiotic properties that we can mainly include in our children's diet are onions, garlic, bananas, artichokes, leeks, asparagus, and legumes.

Hygiene hypothesis: Research has shown that environmental factors that can change the life course of a child's immune system are the infections they have had, vaccinations, nutritional conditions, and the diversity of the gut microbiota. An important point to mention here is the “hygiene hypothesis.”

In simple terms, “While our children who play in the soil in the village or in the field, whose hands are not wiped with disinfectant every time they fall, get sick less often; our children whom we raise with extreme care but who are trapped inside apartment flats, who are constantly holding a tablet and do not know much about street games, get sick much more often...”

According to the hygiene hypothesis, moving further away from natural life in parallel with economic and social development causes our immune system to behave in different ways. The transition from extended family life to nuclear family life, the increase in exposure to tobacco smoke and polluted air in cities, and the inevitable increase in the consumption of genetically modified foods and packaged foods pave the way for the proliferation of allergic diseases.

As this process prolongs, differences occur in the responses our immune system should give to foreign substances, and antibodies called immunoglobulin E begin to be produced against foreign substances that are not harmful to our body. This is partly why we now see “allergic child” diagnoses in crowded cities so frequently.