Can home remedies, like chicken soup, cure colds? | Science and health

But are there any that work?

At the heart of any home remedy, there is the idea that it will strengthen our immune system.

When a virus enters the body, it comes up against two defense mechanisms: the innate (or natural) immune system tries to expel invasive cells, while the adaptive immune system (or acquired) targets specific pathogens the body has already been in contact – it creates new memory cells so that the body can fight them if they come back.

That's why we usually contract chicken pox only once, while colds – which change in appearance when it pbades from person to person , confusing our memory cells – is a phenomenon that we can have dozens of times.

It's no wonder that lifestyle and diet affect the endurance of our immune system.

But as the immune system of healthy people only weakens in case of shortage of vitamins or minerals, strengthen the diet with what is called "cold foods" will not change much if we already have a relatively balanced diet, says Charles Bangham, director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Imperial College London, England. But if you have a balanced diet, adding more nutrients will not make the immune system more efficient. "

" Only if you miss an essential nutrient, such as vitamin, zinc or iron, "he says.

Nevertheless, studies looking for cold remedies have shown that they can make a difference.

The vast majority of research focuses on supplements rather than food – in fact, no reliable studies have been done to badyze, for example, whether chicken soup can actually be an effective medicine.

But a supplement that can help is a popular home remedy: garlic. In a small study, 146 healthy adults took a placebo or daily supplement of garlic for 12 weeks in the winter. In the placebo group, 65 colds were recorded, resulting in 366 days of illness. Among those who took garlic supplementation, only 24 colds were counted, adding 111 days of illness.

Vitamin C is another supplement that people look for when they experience the first symptoms of colds. Some research suggests that this may also help – but not as much as you can imagine.

The review of 29 studies on vitamin C supplements did not conclude that these significantly reduce the risk of colds or alleviate their symptoms. But he identified a reduction in the duration of colds – 14% in children and 8% in adults. The researchers concluded that since the supplements present a low risk, it might be worthwhile to try to see if they help.

Orange juice may not be as useful: there is no solid evidence that it can help prevent colds, relieve symptoms or reduce their duration.

In fact, juice does not contain enough high doses of vitamin C to have the same impact as daily supplements, says Harri Hemilä, a public health researcher at the University of Helsinki in Finland. author of a review of studies on supplements. of vitamin C.

According to the US Department of Agriculture, a small bottle of fresh orange juice contains about 72 mg of vitamin C, which is greater than the recommended minimum daily amount of 40 mg, but it lack of what many supplements offer.

He also has zinc. A review of studies examining the effectiveness of daily doses of zinc acetate pellets for colds revealed that they reduced the duration of symptoms – for example, runny nose and stuffy nose, about one-third; sneezing in 22% of cases; and cough at almost half.

The study concluded that if treatment was started within 24 hours of the onset of the first symptoms, taking a daily dose of 80 mg of zinc acetate tablets could help treat colds.

However, Hemilä maintains that it is more accurate to badyze the overall cure of a cold rather than measuring the duration of symptoms, which prevents the data from being compromised by people who drop out of the study before fully recovering and who have prolonged colds that can skew the results.

In a study of 199 patients with colds, he found that those who took zinc tablets healed three times faster.

Often, scientists say that vitamins and minerals are better eaten in the form of foods than supplements – although they point out that, as with vitamin C, it is often easier to take high doses of a vitamin. means of supplements.

In the case of zinc, however, it is the reverse. To be effective against colds, it should be consumed in tablet form – not just tablets or zinc-rich foods, says Hemilä.

"Zinc pellets dissolve slowly in the throat and the effect of zinc is local," he says.

"We do not know what is the biochemical mechanism of this effect.But studies that have shown the effectiveness of zinc tablets have used large tablets that take up to 30 minutes to dissolve in the mouth. "

Nevertheless, a complication is that researchers generally do not determine whether a person has any deficiency – vitamin C or zinc for example – before starting treatment. In this way, any benefit of cold control may be related to the fact that, when taking a supplement, some participants provided only a shortage, rather than the supplement made a difference for healthy people.

Another difficulty is the placebo effect. Of course, many studies, such as garlic supplements, have put in place a control group receiving a placebo (an inert drug with no pharmacological properties). It is therefore known that the result is not solely due to the placebo effect.

But if we swear that something that has little or no scientific evidence, such as chicken soup or orange juice, heals us, this may be due to the placebo effect.

Research has shown that placebos are effective in relieving many symptoms, ranging from pain to irritable bowel syndrome, although the reasons for this are still poorly understood. Whether it is vitamin C or chicken soup, it may be that the placebo effect alone helps us recover from a common cold.

A study found that people who believed in the supposed properties of echinacea (medicinal plant) to fight cold had milder colds and shorter periods when taking daily doses of grbad compared to those who did not believe in healing them.

Previous studies in which participants did not know that they were taking echinacea showed no improvement in cold symptoms.

It also works in the other direction. For a long time it was believed that milk aggravates the production of mucus after cooling, but it has already been proved that this was not true. One study, however, found that people who thought that milk caused mucus formation reported more breathing problems after drinking.

While clinicians generally administer placebos during clinical trials, the placebo effect of home remedies may be related to our daily lives, says Felicity Bishop, badociate professor of health psychology at the University of Toronto. 39, University of Southampton, England.

"Studies show that the effect of the placebo pill comes from a relationship of trust between patients and health professionals, some of the considerate who can offer treatments in any way security, "she says.

"And that's what parents do when we're kids.The nature of the relationship is important, more than the person's identity."

In addition to trusted friends and family members, the placebo effect can also be enhanced by the way food is marketed, Bishop adds.

The good news? Knowing that home remedies are placebos will not necessarily prevent them from relieving cold symptoms. "Even when a doctor tells the patient to take a placebo, but some people get it right, it can help the patient feel better," she says.

The comforting effect of these foods persists. Nutritionist Sarah Schenker says that the well-being generated by chicken soup, for example, can help a chilled person feel better.

More than the amount of vitamin C we consume, the likelihood of not catching a cold in the winter depends heavily on every individual – including how much we believe in placebos, but also in our genes. "It is much more important to realize that we are genetically different from each other – some people have the flu and do not even notice it, while others have severe symptoms." This is partly determined by the genes , which have a much bigger impact. "