Hello steemians, today I wrote this post to contribute to what #air-clinic is doing.

So let's learn the basics of our immune system.

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Our immune system is a wonderful host defense system comprising of special cells, proteins, tissues, and organs to protects us against diseases. For our immune system to function properly, it must detect a wide variety of agents, known as pathogens, viruses, parasitic worms and the most important part, it should be able to distinguish the harmful ones from our own healthy tissue.

Our immune system does a great job of keeping our bodies healthy and avoiding infections. But occasionally problems with our immune system can lead to disease and infections.

Through a sequence of steps known as the immune response, the immune system attacks organisms and substances that invade body systems and cause disease.

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The immune system’s network of cells has an important cell, that is the white blood cells, leukocytes comes in two basic types that search for and extinguishes disease-causing organisms or substances.

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Leukocytes are formed and kept in many locations in the body, comprising the thymus, spleen, and bone marrow. For this reason, they're termed the lymphoid organs. There are also clumps of lymphoid tissue throughout the body, mostly as lymph nodes, that house the leukocytes.

The leukocytes circulate within the body between the organs and nodes via lymphatic vessels and blood vessels. The immune system works in a coordinated manner to observe the body for germs or substances that might cause problems.

There are two basic types of leukocytes which are:

• Phagocytes, cells that crush up invading organisms
• Lymphocytes, cells that allow the body to reminisce and recognize former invaders and help the body terminate them.

A number of diverse cells are considered phagocytes. The utmost common type is the neutrophil, which primarily fights bacteria. If doctors are worried about a bacterial infection, they might order a blood test, which is a full blood count to see if a patient has an increased number of neutrophils triggered by the infection. Other types of phagocytes have their own jobs to make sure that the body responds suitably to a specific type of invader.

There are two types of lymphocytes and they are

• B lymphocytes and
• T lymphocytes.

Lymphocytes develops from the bone marrow and either stay there and mature into B cells, or they migrate to the thymus gland, where they mature into T cells. B lymphocytes and T lymphocytes have separate functions.

B lymphocytes are similar to the body's military intelligence system, seeking out their targets and sending defenses to lock in on them.
T cells are similar to the soldiers, destroying the invaders that the intelligence system has identified.

Here's how it works:

When antigens (foreign materials that attack the body) are identified, several types of cells work together to recognize them and respond. These cells trigger the B lymphocytes to produce antibodies, which are specialized proteins that lock in onto specific antigens.

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Once formed, these antibodies stay in a person's body, so that if his or her immune system encounters that antigen again, the antibodies are already there to do their job. So if somebody gets sick with a certain disease, like chickenpox and measles, that person usually won't get sick from it again. Also called immunization.

WHAT IS IMMUNIZATION

Immunization, also known as vaccination helps protect you from certain infectious diseases. They boost your body’s immune system. Some of the parasites are taken to make the vaccination. The immunization is given as shots and they come in two forms.

1. The weakened form.
2. The dead form.

The amount of parasites used in the vaccination is a tiny fraction of what can give you the actual disease. This is done so that the body can produce antibodies against it and be able to recognize it the second time it enters the body.

IMMUNITY
Human beings have three main types of immunity

• Innate.
• Adaptive.
• Passive.

INNATE IMMUNITY
Innate immunity is also known as the natural immunity. Everyone is born with it. It is a type of general protection. A lot of of the germs that affect other animals don't harm us. For instance, the viruses that cause leukemia in cats don't affect us as humans. And vice versa.

Innate immunity also has barriers that prevents germs from entering our bodies.

ADAPTIVE IMMUNITY
As the name suggests, it adapts to certain situations. It is developed when our bodies are exposed to diseases. It involves the lymphocytes

PASSIVE IMMUNITY
Passive immunity is taken from another source and it lasts for just a short period of time. A typical example is the antibodies in a mother's breast milk gives the baby temporary immunity to diseases the mother has been exposed to. This mostly helps to protect the baby against infection during the early years of his or her childhood.

We all have different immune systems. Some human beings never appear to get infections, while others seem to be sick most of the time. As we get older, we get exposed to most of the germs and our immune system recognize it and fight them.

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This is @muhammadalikatu from #ghana