Michael Murray MD: The Longevity Matrix
Dr. Michael Murray has quite literally written the Textbook of Natural Medicine for Healthcare Practitioners, as well as the Encyclopaedia of Natural Medicine for the lay public. His latest book, The Longevity Matrix, provides a wealth of valuable information on immune health and its role in combatting the Corona Virus.
The Longevity Matrix – An Interview with Dr. Michael Murray
Interview by Sandie Sedgbeer
Nothing is more important than our health. We’ve heard that phrase so often that, for many, it has faded into background noise. But as has been evident of late, we cannot afford to ignore this any longer. Michael Murray, M.D., is one of the world’s leading authorities on natural medicine and the author of 30 books with six million copies in print. A graduate and former faculty member of Bastyr University in Seattle, he also serves on the Board of Regents. Sandie Sedgbeer sat down with Dr. Michael Murray a few weeks ago to naturally discuss how we can safeguard and boost our health and longevity prospects.
To listen to the full interview of Dr. Michael Murray by Sandie Sedgbeer on her radio show What is Going OM on OMTimes Radio, click the player below.
Sandie Sedgbeer: Dr. Michael Murray, welcome! When we spoke on air a few weeks ago, we discussed several important topics covered in your book, The Longevity Matrix: How to Live Better, Stronger and Longer, which included the immune system and the critical role it plays in fighting viruses and staving off disease. Tell us how the immune system impacts longevity and health generally. Then perhaps we can look at it concerning the SARS CO-V2 virus.
Dr. Michael Murray: The immune system is really intricate. It’s one of the great frontiers of physiology, of the science of studying how our body works. Other body systems have been mapped out really well. Still, we’re continually learning new ways in which our immune system is working to protect us. That’s especially true with aging and the SARS Cov-2 virus responsible for this Pandemic. It’s a complicated subject. The first thing we have to look at is the key components and overall objective of the immune system?
The immune system comprises some of our barrier mechanisms that protect against organisms entering our body. It consists of our white blood cells and the tissues that make them. White blood cells are made in the bone marrow. We have special white blood cells that are matured in the Thymus Gland. This is the Master Gland of the immune system, which lies in a bib-like fashion in our upper chest. It controls an aspect of the immune function called Cell-Mediated Immunity. This arm of the immune system is critical in fighting against viruses. It’s also a critical factor in longevity and in fighting against cancer formation. The health of the thymus is also critical in dealing with the SARS Cov-2 virus.
The lymphatic system, lymphatic vessels, and our spleen are the main components of the immune system. The immune system is a really good reflection of our overall health. One of the things that we’re learning (thanks to this Pandemic) is how important it is to our overall health. When we don’t take care of our immune system, we run the increased risk of having infections and suffering more severe consequences. We see that with this Pandemic.
What we are learning with this Pandemic is that if you have comorbidities – if you are overweight, have high blood pressure, diabetes, or chronic lung disease – you are at an increased risk of developing more severe infection and dying from this virus than if you didn’t have those comorbidities and have a strong immune function. So, when we look at those comorbidities, we have to ask how well they impact immune function? Is there a way to counteract some of the adverse effects these comorbidities have to protect people? And then what can we do to make sure that people who are generally healthy are protected? That’s what I’d like to focus on today. What can we do to support our immune system, and how does that relate to both longevity and this virus that we’re all concerned about?
Sandie Sedgbeer: Yes. What is necessary to support the immune system? What does it thrive?
Dr. Michael Murray: I look at four things that are the foundations of health—a positive mental attitude, a health-promoting lifestyle, an optimal diet, and lastly, supplementary measures, i.e., dietary supplements, herbal products, and other methods to support our health. So, when we look at the first foundation, the power of the positive mental attitude, there’s a long list of scientific investigations into this link and an entire field of study called psychoneuroimmunology, which is devoted to looking at how our attitude, our mind, our thoughts, and emotions influence our immune system. One of the most detrimental states on our immune system is being depressed or stressed out. When we’re under stress, it activates our sympathetic nervous system, the arm of the autonomic or unconscious nervous system responsible for the fight or flight response. Think about what your body would need to get away from a tiger; getting a virus or an infection under control becomes less important because the body’s going to mobilize energy to escape from that immediate danger. When we’re under stress, we activate the sympathetic nervous system, which is extremely immune-suppressive. Many people might be familiar with the drug Prednisone, a form of cortical steroid or cortisol. When under stress, we produce and secrete more cortisol, one of the few hormones that increase with age. With increasing cortisol levels, we get sleep disturbances, depression, and blood sugar issues. Higher cortisol levels lead to Type 2 Diabetes. We get bone and connective tissue breakdown. So, we need to do everything we can to get our stress levels under control. It’s a combination of removing as many straws off that camel’s back as we can but also boosting the strength of that camel’s back.
One of the antidotes to stress is activating our parasympathetic nervous system. This is the arm of our autonomic nervous system responsible for repair, rejuvenation, and restoration. We can activate parasympathetic activity by producing the relaxation response, which is the opposite of the stress response. You can activate this through meditation, prayer, and deep breathing exercises. Nature is built into us. When we are in a relaxed state and breathe with our diaphragm or use those belly muscles for breathing, it sends a signal up to the brain to relax. There’s a method of stopping and taking a breath when you’re starting to feel stressed out. It can arrest that stress response, but we need to consciously set time aside each day to engage in producing that parasympathetic response through deep breathing exercises, meditation, and prayer. I’d say at least five minutes twice a day would be the minimum, and if you’re under a lot of stress, you may need to devote more time. That’s the first foundation of developing a positive mental attitude and activating that parasympathetic nervous system.
The next thing is our lifestyle, which plays a huge role in our immune system’s health. If we’re not getting enough sleep, we are engaged in harmful health habits like excessive drinking of alcohol or not engaging in regular exercise, etc. Not following a healthy lifestyle significantly affects immune function. Studies show that just helping people with some basic lifestyle modification has dramatic effects on improving immune function. One special cell a white blood cell that is improved is called the natural killer cell, and it’s getting a lot of attention right now in Covid 19. It’s given its name because when it gets next to a cancer cell or a cell infected by a virus, or some sort of disease-causing organism, it will literally kill that organism. So, it’s a really crucial component of our immune system defense. Just changing or improving a person’s lifestyle has dramatic effects on that natural killer cell activity. These are things that people don’t really think about in terms of how they impact their immune system. They may know they need to rest and get some good sleep, but they may not realize that certain health practices or unhealthy practices are detrimental to our immune function.
The next area is diet. If you look at the effects of sugar on the immune system, oh my gosh. Higher blood sugar levels basically paralyze white blood cells’ ability to move and migrate to areas of infection and then act on pathogens, disease-causing organisms. So, sugar levels in the diet and blood are significant to get under control if you want to have a really good functioning immune system.
Other dietary factors that are important—your immune system requires every known nutrient to function properly— so, the efficiency of any vitamin, mineral, or single nutrient, has significant disruption of the immune system. So, we want to make sure we are eating a healthy diet. But I also think that taking a good high-potency, multiple vitamin and mineral formula is really important. We know that giving people who are nutrient-deficient the nutrient they need leads to remarkable immune function improvements. This has been shown in elderly subjects. Typically, as people age, their immune system starts to function sub-optimally, and, like a lot of conditions we associate with aging, we say, “oh, it’s a side-effect of aging.” Well, it’s not, because if you give older people with some immune suppression a high-potency, multiple vitamins, and mineral formula, their immune system comes back to a more youthful state. So, if we give the cells in our body the tools they need to be healthy, they’ve got a better chance of being healthy. In our immune system, these cells respond well to super nutrition. Nutrition is the critical factor for most people in determining the function of their immune system.
Continue to Page 2 of the Interview with Dr. Michael Murray
