5 Natural Remedies for Winters Aches and Ills

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  Posted by james s Mon Dec 1, 2008 8:09am PST

  "Echinacea has been proven not to work."

  really? in what large randomized study? oh, that's right! there isn't one that shows it being any more effective than a sugar pill, but your herbal nutritionist said the indians took it to ward off evil spirits. six of his friends took it along with a diet of lemon-ginger-hemp soup and prayer to jah while standing in a cave and reciting old mother hubbard over and over for a week and none of them got a cold all winter that year.

  that's enough of a study for me...

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  Posted by P.F. Mon Dec 1, 2008 8:11am PST

  Vitamin C is well known as a placebo, any benefit it possesses it only possesses because the subject believes it will work, if you could get someone to believe in tap water instead of orange juice or your Vit-C cough syrup it would work just as well as the Vit-C in these remedies.

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  Posted by james s Mon Dec 1, 2008 8:14am PST

  sorry. misread. echinacea doesn't work. you're right. my bad.

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  Posted by ChristineJ Mon Dec 1, 2008 9:05am PST

  What a bunch of bull. Echinacea was shown not to be any better than placebo in preventing colds or making them less vicious or shorter lasting--no affect at all. Sadly, vitamin C doesn't prove itself particularly useful either. If you are taking Plavix or a baby aspirin or any other treatment to make your platelets less sticky, do NOT, I repeat do NOT increase your intake of Vitamin K. You are undermining everything the other remedies are doing for you. If you get nosebleeds from dry heated air, moisturize your nose (not rocket science, is it? No it isn't!) by flushing it with either some warm salty water (about as salty as tears will work wonders), or sucking in some steam when you shower, or, if you want to spend some money, an over the counter moisturizer like "Little Noses." Here are some things that WILL work. Don't pick your nose. You weaken the insides of it (more nosebleeds) and you pick up all the little buggies that your nose's mucus has trapped. Use a Kleenex. When you sneeze, sneeze into your elbow, not your hand. No one uses their elbow to shake hands, open a door, etc. And wash your hands! Wash them often! No need to use anything fancy, in fact, avoid antibacterial soaps. All you will do is expose the bacteria which survive (and most of them will, that's what has kept them around so long!) to yet another weapon in our arsenal, so if you want to help put off more superbugs from developing, just use regular soap and water! Wipe off telephones, computer keyboards and doorknobs (even at work) so that you don't pick up any ewww from them. Take some antibacterial wipes with you shopping (or alcohol gel, and then make sure your hands are good and wet with it, and wipe off the handles of the shopping cart). And for pity's sake, get a flu shot and, if appropriate, a pneumonia shot--these suggestions will keep you a lot farther away from the sad influenza statistics than anything in this stupid column! Incidentally, eating chicken soup (or any soup) will do more for your snotty nose than adding garlic. Garlic is linked to increasing the strength of your immune system--there's nothing whatever about it that helps you make less snot. The warmth, the steam and the fluids are what works with the chicken soup, although other warm fluids didn't fare as well in the research. Some people say to avoid dairy if you have a cold--I don't know about that one. Try it and see if it works for you. And wash your hands!!!! Christine J., RN

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  Posted by Catfishgal Mon Dec 1, 2008 11:33am PST

  I'd like to add my favorite wintertime herbal cure - slippery elm bark tea. I worked on the phone for a couple of winters and this was the best thing to get rid of the scratchy voice that goes with the cold.

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  Posted by Jeremy Tue Dec 2, 2008 11:00am PST

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8YleeFN6Uw

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  Posted by Teresa Wed Dec 3, 2008 2:19pm PST

  my mom makes a tea of lemon verbena, thyme, rosemary, bayleaves and sweetens it with lots of honey. she might even squeeze some lemon juice into it. it helps.

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