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If the common cold starts with sniffles, and if you can stop the sniffles "cold", have you got a cure for the common cold?
Probably not, but it might qualify as a pretty effective treatment. Not to mention it can't be assumed to work for everyone. But it sure is simple and cheap, if you happen to
live most places in the industrialized world.
Here is the procedure, to be followed as soon as you consciously notice you have the sniffles.
1. Blow nose into tissue to give you a few minutes before you have to do it again.
2. Turn on the tap water (cold or warm, but not hot), and wash your hands. Be sure to use some sort of soap. Then rinse, of course.
3. With the water still running, make a cup from your hands, and catch some water fresh from the tap. Turn off the water flow at any point after this.
4. Keep hands over sink, and lower your nose (and nearby part of face) into the water that your cupped hands are holding.
5. Snort, GENTLY. You only want to flood your sinus passageways with tap water. You DON'T want any of it in your lungs!
6. After a couple of seconds, expel air through the nose, to clear out the water.
7. Dry your hands and face with a towel and then, to get the last bits of water out, blow your nose into a tissue.
That's all. This trick assumes that your public water supply is chlorinated, true for most of the industrialized world. If it is, you WILL be able to smell it during the snort! It will strongly remind you of the average public swimming pool. Very possibly you will feel an unpleasant stinging sensation, too. That's good; it means the chlorine is attacking bacteria and viruses all over the surfaces of your sinus passageways (simultaneously with causing the stinging). If you can withstand the stinging for almost-literally 2 seconds, then you will probably find that your sniffles will be stopped "cold". Certainly I've never needed to do this more than twice on the same day, after which, usually, weeks or more go by before I notice any more sniffles. (There are claims that a diet rich in various green vegetables helps prevent colds, too, and in the interest of full disclosure of anti-cold factors, I confess to usually pigging out on veggies on a snort-day.)
In closing I should mention that I thought this up and tried it out years before I discovered that there is a gadget on the market designed for water-snorting. If I recall right, though, you weren't expected to use ordinary chlorinated tap water with it; the maker was trying to sell some sort of medication, too, so highly purified water was likely required. I count them as 3 unnecessary expenses.
Nasal lavage, nasal irrigation, or, sinus rinsing.
http://www.myhealth...m/F031230_nose.html
“I am a strong believer in nasal lavage,” adds Dr. Ralph Metson, another sinus specialist at Mass Eye and Ear. But people need to do it with salty water “to wash out mucus.” [pyggy potamus, Dec 14 2007]
Neti-pot
http://www.himalaya...otInstructions.aspx
in one nostril and out the other ! - a most excellent process that I have used many times with great effect. I only use a tiny amount of salt in contrast to that shown in video. [xenzag, Dec 14 2007]
[link]
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Wouldn't sniffing the vapours of something suitable to kill rhinoviruses do the same thing, only more effectively as it would also get those that have taken up residence in your lungs? |
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[custard], first define "something suitable". Chlorine is not a good choice (was used as a poison gas in World War I); it can severely damage lung tissue. Not to mention that rhinoviruses are called that because "rhino" means "nose" (and "rhinoceros" means "nose horn"). The nose is the primary place where they do their thing. OTHER organisms typically infest the lungs. |
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You're assuming that the virus doesn't turn up in the lungs at all. The act of breathing will ensure they are spread throughout the respiratory system. |
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Something suitable would be benzalkonium chloride, which is used in eyedrops and nasal sprays already. |
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err, if you think that actually works, only thing I can think of is the chlorine is inflaming your sinuses so they can't drain. |
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Chlorine is a *bad* thing, btw. Don't stick some up your nose or anywhere else on your person, for that matter. It's very poisonouse, the Chlorine takes the place of Oxygen in compounds and it's more reactive. |
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You lot must live in a place where there is extremes of Cl in the water supply! Yes, it is detectable but not as strong as a swimming pool. At the concentrations it is at in water it would take over 15 minutes of contact to kill even most of the bacteria/viruses to a notable level. It's also not good as there are natural, helpful bacteria that live in the nasal passages and killing them does not really help you. |
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[Flying Toaster], botulism toxin is a BAD thing, but they still use it in "botox" treatments. It is quantity of chlorine that is dangerous, more so than its existence; the human body is tougher than individual viruses and bacteria, because of things like mucus layers. So, the mucus mostly protects the sinus region, while the bacteria and viruses are in the mucus, and chlorinated water has to pass through the mucus to get at the body tissues. |
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[webfishrune], generally you mostly can't smell the chlorine in tap water, only traces escape to the air for sniffing. But when the water is inside the nose, the chlorine in the water can be directly sensed. The nose doesn't care HOW the molecules arrive, that it can detect. |
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Next, I tend to doubt that a 2-second immersion will kill all the friendly bacteria, or even all the cold viruses. But the REDUCTION must be significant, if the sniffles stop. Remember that the immune system is ultimately why a cold ends, and the immune system always needs time to rev up to the latest challenge. Reducing the magnitude of a cold invasion helps get you that time. |
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I'm not so convinced your science is on track, [Vernon]. |
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Probably the most effective treatment to kill rhinoviruses would be to breathe dry air heated above 40degC for 6-8 hours. It works very well to halt a common cold, by preventing viral replication of the offending "bug". It's neither comfortable nor simple to implement but may be the most effective treatment of the lot. A sauna will achieve the same end, reasonably well. |
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In fact, rhinoviruses are confined to the upper respiratory passages because they are extremely inefficient at replication beyond about 33degC, which is why they don't infect the lungs. I'm surprised I've never seen it advocated. |
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They are also prone to disassembly in low pH environments (unlike their close cousins in the Picornaviridae family, the polioviruses), because the capsid (outer protein capsule) degrades rapidly in the acid, which is why they don't infect the gut. |
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If you could withstand it then a shot of lemon juice up each nostril would also do the trick, I guess. |
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Chicken soup introduces steam to the equation, reducing their ability to replicate and also assisting with the clearance of debris from the nasal passages. The Greeks appear to have invented chicken soup, though they could not have known that it also appears to inhibit neutrophil propagation, reducing the rate at which healthy cells are destroyed by our own immune responses. Neutrophils really play no part in inhibiting viral infections, as they are only effective against bacteria. |
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Zinc sprays work, as they also inhibit the ability to generate viral progeny, in much the same fashion as heat does. It must be administered as a spray, because the zinc has to come into direct contact with the virus, in order to block the binding pockets on the surface of the virus. Oral zinc medications will not be effective. Zinc will reduce the duration of a cold from 10-14 days, down to 4-7 days, it has been found. |
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However, it should be remembered that the hundred or so rhinoviruses are only responsible for about 50% of all colds, with adenoviruses and a few others taking up the slack. |
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I get a cold/flu once a year. It starts in my throat and then goes to my lungs or ears. If it goes to ears, I go to the doctor. If it goes to the lungs I've found I can usually kill it in a day if I go to my local health club and sit in the hot tub for 15 minutes. They put crazy amounts of Chlorine in the water. I have a little hot tub at home that gets just as hot and I can stay in longer but it only takes Bromine and I found that doesn't work on my colds/flu. I'll have to try this next time, but I'm a little worried about drowning. |
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. I was just starting to search to see if this was a unique idea, when I found this. |
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[MisterQED], think about the positions of your head and neck when you bend over to snort some water. Water can't enter the lungs unless you snort enough, pulling it uphill, to go over a kind of hump (at the back of the mouth is the other entrance to the sinus cavity). If you are careful, you will not drown. |
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I thought it was a fancy noseplug |
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