Don't Cross Your Eyes...They'll Get Stuck That Way!: And 75 Other Health Myths Debunked (25 page)

Why shouldn’t you use your mouth? The mouth is not especially clean. If you read our previous book, this should come as no surprise. The human mouth is full of bacteria, and licking a cut is a great way to get those germs into your cut. For example, the
New England Journal of Medicine
reported on a German man with diabetes who licked his thumb after a bicycle accident. Although the wound was minor, his thumb became infected with
Eikenella corrodens
, and it had to be amputated. That bacterium is commonly found in the mouth, and it was believed that his licking the wound led to the loss of his thumb.

Another report linked a rare circumcision ritual with genital herpes. A small number of Orthodox Jews practice circumcision in which the man performing the circumcision sucks the blood from the baby’s wound until it stops bleeding. A manuscript published in
Pediatrics
described a number of Jewish infants who developed genital herpes not long after birth. Many of them had pretty severe infections or complications. When the available infants were tested, all were positive for carrying herpes in their mouths.

Although these are extreme examples, your mouths are not clean. You wouldn’t clean a wound with a dirty wet rag, so don’t clean one with your dirty wet mouth. Keep your tongue, and your mouth, away from cuts and wounds.

Zinc

I have just the thing for that cold … Zinc

It seems like we have gone through a hundred potential cures for the common cold, and yet nothing seems to work. Here is a scintillating surprise: zinc might, just might help you with your sniffles and stuffiness.

When we first considered the evidence for zinc and colds, using a review that combined the results from eight different studies, zinc did not seem to prevent or shorten colds. A newer review published in 2011 includes almost twice as many studies, and the combined new evidence suggests that zinc could actually improve your cold symptoms and shorten their duration by about a day. The effect is strongest if you start taking zinc within the first twenty-four hours that you experience cold symptoms. Those zealous people rushing to offer you a zinc lozenge may have a point; zinc works best if you use it at the very first sniffle!

Whether zinc can actually prevent you from developing a cold remains an open question. The review provided some evidence that people who took zinc regularly for at least five months (that’s a long-term commitment!) had fewer colds, but these studies were of lower quality than the studies looking at the impact of zinc on cold symptoms. The research quality is such that this will need to be studied more before we have a definitive answer as to whether zinc really prevents colds.

On balance, it is important to know that using those zinc lozenges could also make you feel bad in new ways. Zinc tastes horrible! In a blind taste test, we bet it would come in third after a rotting dead skunk and old gym socks. In fact, zinc lozenges were more likely to make people feel nauseous than they were to improve cold symptoms. People who use zinc lozenges are also more likely to have distorted taste and irritation in their mouths. The zinc might work for your cold, but it could make you prone to puking and not able to taste as well. Hmmm.

In fact, zinc’s terrible taste actually hurts the science in these studies. Since the placebo pill did not taste like a gym sock, the study participants who got the zinc probably knew what they were taking. When people in a study know whether or not they are getting the thing being studied, the results are not as trustworthy.

There is an added zinc-related caution. In studies of zinc nasal gel, the gel improves cold symptoms and shortens colds, but it can permanently damage your sense of smell. Losing your sense of smell (and your sense of taste, which is affected by how well you can smell) is not a good price to pay for shortening your cold! Makers of a zinc nasal gel have actually paid out over $12 million in lawsuits to people with damaged senses of smell.

The bottom line is that zinc might help your cold, but it could also make you feel nauseous and alter your sense of taste. You might think zinc is worth a try, but you should know that zinc’s benefits might not come so easily.

Acknowledgments

Both of us would like to say thank you to Jacob Brenner, who spent a summer helping us do much of the research behind this book. Additionally, we would like to thank the Indiana University School of Medicine Department of Pediatrics and the Division of Children’s Health Services Research, as well as Riley Hospital for Children for their support. We are so appreciative of our agents, Sheree Bykofsky and Janet Rosen, as well as our editor, Alyse Diamond, who is also our go-to person for lunch when we are lucky enough to head to New York City.

Aaron would additionally like to thank his family and friends for their unending love and support. He is especially grateful for Jacob, who makes him think, Noah, who makes him laugh, and Sydney, who always holds his hand. He still marvels that he is married to Aimee, whom he loves madly, and who tolerates him better than anyone else in the world.

Rachel thanks Joe Fick, who takes good care of all living things in his sphere, including her. She also gives thanks to her wonderful family. Tom and Jacki Vreeman are not responsible for her desire to debunk parental wisdom except in that they raised a well-educated, independent thinker, and for this Rachel thanks them especially. Rachel appreciates her cheering section on both sides of the ocean, with special thanks to her favorite women (especially Elizabeth, Maria, Jessica, Lorrie, and Jessica), the Vreeman tribe, the Fountain Square Supper Club, and the I.U. Kenya team. Rachel also acknowledges that Aaron is almost always right.

References

You know what’ll really get rid of that cold?… Acupuncture!

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ADHD medication will stunt your child’s growth

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The air you breathe will make you sick … if you’re near a sniffler and sneezer

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I have just the thing for that cold … Airborne

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Airplane travel will make you sick

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Aloe vera will heal a burn—TRUE

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