Natural Treatments for Cold Sores

If you are or your kids is a regular cold sore sufferer, the first thing that you should do is avoid foods that are too acidic or salty. Furthermore, foods such as chocolate, peanuts, grains, oatmeal and whole-wheat may be good for you in some ways but if you are a cold sore sufferer, these foods can exacerbate your condition because they are high in arginine.
Arginine is an essential amino acid but there is evidence that having too much of this particular amino is in conflict with lysine, another essential amino acid which helps fight against herpes simplex. Hence, cutting down on argenine-rich foods allows lysine to do its work more efficiently.
You should also increase the amount of foods that are rich in vitamins A, C and E that you consume as these vitamins help fight herpes, with a recommended dose of at least 5000 mg of vitamin C a day being highly desirable. You should also increase the amount of iron and (particularly) zinc that you ingest every day as it is believed that these trace minerals also help to keep the herpes virus under control.
Basically, what you need to do is increase your general ‘wellness' levels because although it is not known exactly why the dormant herpes simplex virus generates cold sores every now and then, it is obvious that there must be some reason why this happens. It is also not unreasonable to assume that the stronger and healthier you are, the less likely it is to happen, so improving the overall quality of your diet might be all that you need to do to keep cold sores at bay.
Another health giving food that is widely recommended is garlic as it contains allicin which is one of the strongest natural antibacterials known to man. It is however best if garlic is taken either raw or in the form of garlic capsules because if it is cooked, a degree of the goodness is lost.
Eating plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables is also highly advisable, with organic produce being the best because of the high level of natural nutrients contained in produce of this nature.
Lysine can be obtained from many foods such as milk, eggs, red meat, brewer's yeast, wheat germ and fish, so one step in the right direction would be to increase the amount of these foods that you consume.
Even so, there may be times when you should boost your herpes resistance with lysine supplements as evidence indicates that thinking 1000mg of lysine three times a day reduces cold sore healing time by a considerable margin.

Beware of Antibiotics

As a general rule, you should resist taking antibiotics unless it is absolutely necessary for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, there is plenty of evidence that Western doctors are increasingly happy to prescribe antibiotics for almost any medical condition, almost irrespective of whether that condition is likely to respond favorably to antibiotics or not.
This has unfortunately made the average man or woman in the street far more dependent on antibiotics than any previous generation has ever been. Consequently, it has become increasingly common to hear of the development of new strains of ‘super bug' that are resistant to the effects of antibiotics, with the most extreme example being MRSA.
As long as we continue to rely on antibiotics to deal with every medical condition, superbugs like MRSA will continue to develop, which ultimately puts our health at greater risk, rather than making us safer.
Now, there has to be a ‘rider' or exception introduced here, because if you have undergone surgery for any medical condition that is serious enough to justify it, you definitely do need as much protection as you can get, especially when you are still in hospital where the risk of cross infection is greater than it would be once you are home.
In this case, refusing antibiotics may not be the smartest move as it is clear that in this situation, they may be the best thing for you even though they are not perfect. Even though you know that a ‘super bug' like MRSA is resistant to antibiotics and that there can be antibiotic side-effects, accepting the drugs in this situation may be the safest course of action.
However, if your doctor prescribes antibiotics in a situation where all you are suffering from is simple boils, then the need to take them becomes far less clear. And because there are potential side-effects, you should definitely think twice before doing so.
According to another report published by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention in 2008, taking antibiotics puts 142,000 people into the hospital emergency room every year in the USA. Furthermore, and perhaps most surprisingly, it is the most commonly prescribed antibiotics that represent the biggest risk and it is adults in the prime of their life who are most likely to suffer an adverse reaction to antibiotics with 41.2% of emergency room visits being made by those aged 15 to 44 years old.