You can’t see it. But it’s there. Coursing through your bloodstream just waiting to pounce...on unsuspecting microbes. Yep, it’s your immune system. Weird, misunderstood and probably my favourite perk of being human, aside from your gut of course.
Here to chat everything immunity, is my friend Dr. Jennifer Gardy—a gifted science communicator, brilliant infectious disease epidemiologist, and the author of the incredible new book for preteens It Takes Guts: How the body turns food into fuel (and poop)!
About Dr Jennifer Gardy:
By day, Dr. Jennifer Gardy works in infectious disease epidemiology. After a ten-year career using DNA analysis to track disease outbreaks at the British Columbia Centre for Disease Control, she took a senior leadership role at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation where, since 2019, she’s been leading the Foundation’s work on malaria epidemiology. When not tracking infectious disease around the world, Jennifer is a noted science communicator, hosting many episodes of CBC TV’s The Nature of Things and authoring two childrens’ science books.
On this episode we chat about:

How Jenn got interested in infectious diseases, germs, and vaccinations at a very young age
What actually goes on at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
What the fight against malaria looks like
What is public health practice, anyways?
The degree to which ALL aspects of health are intertwined and the social determinants of health
Why Jenn swallowed a camera for science!
How clean your colon really is! Hint: there are no old cells or bits of food we need to “cleanse” out...
The rundown on one of our body’s most complex networks: our immune system! How it works, what cells are involved and what you need to know
Does your gut health really have anything to do with your immune system?

Learned something new? Have questions?
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Connect with Jenn:
Instagram: @jennifergardy
Twitter: @jennifergardy
Website: www.jennifergardy.com
Book: It’s Catching, The Infectious World of Germs and Microbes and It Takes Guts: How Your Body Turns Food Into Fuel (and Poop)
Jenn’s Recommendations:
Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Underrated Organ by Giulia Enders