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> They tend to believe that the body naturally heals itself. If I had a cold, growing up in New Zealand, I was told, "Eat a cucumber," or, "Have a drink of what
by deogeo 7y ago
> They tend to believe that the body naturally heals itself. If I had a cold, growing up in New Zealand, I was told, "Eat a cucumber," or, "Have a drink of what the neighbour made."
Well, the body does heal itself, most of the time. But her description of a cold puzzles me - is it normal to take medicine (as opposed to just tea or soup) for an ordinary cold? Because taking drugs for something as minor as a cold is utterly alien to me.
- Firerouge 7y agoDayQuil/NyQuil (acetaminophen, antihistamine, cough suppressant) are fairly commonly used to address common cold symptoms.
- deogeo 7y agoI have to say this reeks of overmedication.
- orhmeh09 7y agoCan you explain why you feel this way?
- deogeo 7y agoAnecdotal of course, but in the case of a common cold (as opposed to one where symptoms are unusually severe, or lasts too long) no-one in my family takes medicine (other than tea with honey and lemon), and the cold goes away just fine. I get the strong impression this is true for most of Europe. A little less anecdotally, a cold is a viral infection, so medicine will mostly target only its symptoms, not the underlying cause. If the symptoms are bearable, then this looks like a bad idea to me - I'm inclined to think the symptoms are there for a reason.
- Nursie 7y agoNobody is taking medication to cure the cold, just make it more bearable. Being unable to breathe through your nose serves little purpose I can think of. Your 'most of Europe' doesn't really fit with my experience of the UK.
- ambentzen 7y agoHaven't you heard, the UK is not part of Europe anymore. As a generally healthy Dane, when I get the cold or the flu I generally don't take any medications for it, and neither does most of the people I know.
- amalter 7y agoThe symptoms are caused by the virus reproducing. At least take cough suppressant. The rest just makes you feel a little less awful. All the studies show the current OTC remedies don’t shorten illness duration (which conversely means they don’t lengthen it either). The “evolutionary response” hypothesis is a lesser form of “smart people going with their gut instead of science” - which is partly how we’ve gotten into this mess in the first place. Smart people seem to get important things wrong quite a lot.
- deogeo 7y agoNot taking medicine unless necessary still seems like a good default - there's two sides to this mess: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overmedication https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overmedication
- mikeash 7y agoHaving a cold sucks. These medicines make it suck less. Why not take advantage?
- sebazzz 7y agoIs there risk involved in using these medicine?
- mikeash 7y agoI’m sure there’s some, but tiny. There’s risk from the symptoms too, so it’s not clear which is worse.
- Arnt 7y agoErik Naggum used to say something along the lines of "if you dull your ability to feel sick, you also dull your joy of feeling well, and your ability to spot the difference".
- Luc 7y agoIt feels appropriate to suppress the symptoms of the cold (headache, coughs, stuffy nose) while it runs its course. Some people do find it virtuous to suffer a little, but that's another matter.
- whiddershins 7y agoAre cold symptoms maladaptive? The “symptom” is an immune system response to a pathogen. To me, it seems rational to default to assuming the symptom has an evolved purpose, a mechanism in fighting infection, and not counteract it unless absolutely necessary.
- Luc 7y agoAFAIK the medical consensus is that the virus exploits the cough reaction etc. to infect other hosts. E.g. quick random Google: https://bmjopenrespres.bmj.com/content/3/1/e000118 https://bmjopenrespres.bmj.com/content/3/1/e000118 "The commonest form of cough is caused by upper respiratory tract infection and has no benefit to the host. The virus hijacks this natural defence mechanism in order to propagate itself through the population."
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- orev 7y agoRecovery is greatly enhanced by getting good sleep, and taking medication at night to suppress symptoms so you can get a good night’s sleep is far better for your recovery than toughing it out. It may not entirely reduce the duration of the illness, but it will certainly help reduce the severity.
- senectus1 7y agoIf I have snot running down the front of my face and down the back of my neck then I'll take a cold/flu tablet to dry me up. otherwise... just deal with it
- marci 7y agoA good documentary on the issue in the UK: https://youtu.be/1w3QJjpwJhA?t=242 https://youtu.be/1w3QJjpwJhA?t=242
- DanBC 7y ago"Don't take unnecessary medication" is different from "do this naturopathic cucumber bullshit to cure your cold".
- bengale 7y agoI'll normally take a decongestant, but not like antibiotics or anything.
- orev 7y agoGood, because antibiotics do nothing for a cold which is viral. Antibiotics only work on bacteria. Anyone who demands antibiotics because they have a cold is completely unqualified to make even the most basic decisions about their own treatment.
- Synaesthesia 7y agoWhen I’m feeling really crappy during a cold, a bit of codeine and aspiring really helps with the symptoms. People ask me what “I’m taking” for a cold but there’s not much you can do about a viral infection other than take ARV’s (which is quite extreme!) The whole Vitamin C thing is a total myth although I do believe a good diet helps.
- hunta2097 7y agoVitamin C is a myth, Vitamin D3 however does affect the immune system. Best taken with magnesium and calcium. Also important for bone health. Most people would benefit from vitamin D3 supplements in the darkest months. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3166406/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3166406/
- lightlyused 7y agoI started taken D3 this winter. It really helped with the seasonal depression.
- 2Ccltvcm 7y agoAside from D3 most of the world that doesn't regularly eat lots of fermented foods regularly lacks in K2. This results in calcium building up in arterial walls rather than being shuttled into bones and tissues. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4566462/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4566462/
- steve19 7y agoTake Vit K with D, it mitigates some side effects. Often D3 and K are combined in supplements. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5613455/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5613455/
- senectus1 7y agoVit C is still in undecided territory.. smack in the middle of can help and placebo...
- rixed 7y agoIn France I've heard it's popular for doctors to say that "a cold one do not treat lasts for a long week, while if one takes medication then it only lasts for seven days".
- Nursie 7y agoDepends how rotten I feel, but decongestants to clear the sinuses/nasal passages and aspirin or paracetamol to help control body temperature definitely help make it suck less. Why not? There's no nobility to suffering if you don't have to.
- jddj 7y agoThere are a few reasons beyond pride why the line for when to use paracetamol etc differs among individuals. Propensity to take or avoid unnecessary medication is something that probably aligns to certain psychological traits, as well as being picked up from parents and peers in childhood. Also, some people suffer more than others in treatable ways (my mother regularly had headaches, I rarely do). I personally avoid unnecessary medication (not in any active sense, but more like "ehh it's not really bad enough and it'll be over soon") whenever possible and could probably count on one hand the number of times I've taken any in the last 10 years, but on the other hand I have friends who take great joy in having something (or things) on hand for just about any ailment which someone might mention in passing. One possible reason is that some people weigh the tax on their liver and/or stomach more strongly than a brief temperature. These medications, although amazing and broadly safe, aren't altogether without tradeoffs. I guess for me it's that I don't suffer very much from the symptoms of minor illnesses, and possibly that I want to save my liver damage for alcohol.
- Nursie 7y agoThe tax on ones liver is a temporary affair, AFAICT, rather than any sort of cumulative damage. You may make your choices, and I shall respect them. It was the implied criticism in the original post that I responded to really (confirmed in other posts when the same poster called any other habit "over medicating"). For me the symptoms themselves can pose problems - if I get inflammation of the nose and ear canals during a cold, and they block up, I seem to be prone to ear infections. Decongestants etc are a good preventative measure for that as well as making the whole thing less crappy.
- nickjj 7y agoI normally don't take any medications for a cold. Truthfully, ever since I started walking a few miles a day outside I very rarely get colds or "minor" illnesses. In the past I would get a cold maybe once every year or 2, and then it would suck for about a week while riding it out. I used to get bad colds too. To the point where when I was kid they wanted to put tubes in my ears to drain liquid out. But the last time I had a cold was ~5 years ago. I remember last year I spent 6 hours sitting directly next to someone on a plane who looked severely ill with cold-like symptoms. Sniffing every 20 seconds, clearing his throat often, looked super pale, major bags under his eyes. Overall looked miserable. I thought I was done for, but somehow managed to not get sick in potentially one of the worst situations possible for getting sick. I don't know what to make of it but I remember my dad telling me that often times the kids of a farmer are the healthiest people around and the moral there is they were constantly around things that might not be considered sanitary so their bodies built up a natural immunity. Basically, mild exposure to non-ideal things helps you out a lot (which includes vaccinations for more serious non-common germs of course).