HOW TO BEAT A COLD IN 6 STEPS

The highly contagious virus is literally everywhere -- from doorknobs to elevator buttons to the handle on your cart in the supermarket, where it can live for hours. This is how you can beat it.

Gargle with water.
A recent Japanese study found that people who gargled with water three times a day had 36 percent fewer colds than those who didn't gargle at all. Gargle with water before brushing your teeth in the morning, after you eat lunch, and at night.

Use your own pen.
At stores, restaurants, the gym, and the doctor's office, pull out your own ballpoint to sign credit slips and check-in sheets.

Get moving.
People who are  the most physically active daily, whether through sports, exercise, or chores such as shoveling snow, are  20 percent to 30 percent less likely to develop colds than couch potatoes were.

Drink hot tea.
A Harvard study shows that sipping tea may boost your body's defenses against infection. White tea is best.

Don't smoke.
It destroys the cilia -- little hair like fibers inside the nose and lungs -- which help keep germs out.  Exposure to secondhand smoke may do the same, so if your partner smokes, encourage him to quit or insist that he light up outside.

Eat breakfast.
Cereal eaters are less likely to catch respiratory illnesses and colds than those who skip breakfast.