Saline spray may help control flu

The Washington Times ^ | November 30, 2004 | Maggie Fox

[neverdem]

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The Washington Times
www.washingtontimes.com

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Saline spray may help control flu

By Maggie Fox
REUTERS NEWS AGENCY
Published November 30, 2004

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Simply inhaling a saltwater spray could help prevent the spread of diseases including flu and tuberculosis, U.S. and German researchers reported yesterday.

    They found a saline spray, administered using a device called a jet nebulizer, reduced the number of germ-spreading droplets by as much as 70 percent for six hours.

    The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could provide a way to help control epidemics, such as the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome that spread globally and killed many health care workers trying to help patients.

    The findings also might help control any global influenza pandemic, which almost all health researchers believe is coming and which could kill millions.

    The researchers noted much more study was needed before a saline spray device could be marketed to prevent the spread of diseases.

    Gerhard Scheuch of Harvard University and colleagues there and at biotechnology firms Pulmatrix and Inamed tested 11 volunteers, giving them the oral spray and then measuring how many particles they released when coughing.

    "Viruses known to spread from humans and/or animals through breathing, sneezing, and coughing include measles, influenza virus, adenovirus, African swine fever virus, foot and mouth disease virus, Varicella zoster virus (chicken pox), infectious bronchitis virus and smallpox, among others," they wrote.

    Bacteria spread in airborne droplets include anthrax, Escherichia coli and tuberculosis.

    Mr. Scheuch's team noted some people produced many more little droplets or bioaerosols than others -- something also seen by investigators of...

[Robert_Paulson2]

the vaccine is the source of the virii.

I will NEVER believe differently.
It's a solution looking for a problem... and a big government prop up of the pharmaceutical industry...

EVERY person I know who has gotten the 'flu shot' in any year, always comes down IMMEDIATELY with a weak version of that infection... and manages to spread it to the spouse, kids, parents or co workers, who get the 'full blown version' and suffer for months passing it back and forth.

IT is smarter to just wash your hands obsessively in the winter, use hand sanitizer very very often, and stay 20 feet or more away from coughers in public and quarantine yourself if you catch anything... instead of being a 'good employee' with a 'great work ethic' and working yourself and your coworkers into walking pneumonia, bronchitus and inner ear infections that can hospitalize.

that flu shot is a scam.
and only those with a compromised immune system should be getting it and even then under restrictions. in medicine sometimes the treatment is more dangerous than the disease.

this saltwater treatment... probably does as much to stop the disease spread as any vaccine...

[bjs1779]

With a little ozone in the house and a particular brand of silver water I use when I feel something coming on, I never get anything that lasts 24 hours. 7 years and counting.

[reagan_fanatic]

With a little ozone in the house and a particular brand of silver water I use when I feel something coming on, I never get anything that lasts 24 hours. 7 years and counting.

Drinking too much silver can be bad for your health ;)

[bigcheese]

Wowzer! I was just telling my girlfriend the other day that I was going to get a vaporizer, some salt water for it and run it at night when I was sleeping because I've caught so many bad colds(?) the last year or two....

I had not heard of any studies like this, I just was going on that I grew up in S. Texas and was on one boat or another practically every day of my life, and rarely had any sickness then.

I also have a gut feeling that the more salinity in the water, the better the protection. In Texas, I was usually found somewhere on the back bays all the time ...very salty water and air. Here in Florida (E. Coast), I lived on the beach for awhile and I can tell you the Atlantic water and air is not nearly as salty. Seems like I have had more sickness out here. Course, the beach out here also has alot more beer and girls, so that could have something to do with it ;-)

[Ditter]

Where do you live?

[Ditter]

In years past a live virus was used in the vaccine and it did give you a light case of the flu. For this reason I refused to take a flu shot. Then we moved to a town where everyone came down with the flu every year. The kids went to high school sick and it passed to the families.

I got so tired of being sick every year I decided to start taking a flu shot. To my surprise, now a killed virus is used and you DO NOT get the flu from the vaccine, a sore spot on your arm or where ever but that is ALL.

[tahiti]

I agree.

[Old Professer]

And a scant 30 years ago the world laughed at Howard Hughes...

[Old Lady]

Suggestions to avoid flu and colds:

If you have to go to a doctor's office, don't touch the magazines (since people with the creeping bots thumb through them all day). Don't touch your hands to your eyes or your mouth. Wash your hands frequently. When you come home, change your clothes and take a shower.

[neverdem]

Thanks for the thought, but sick folks come to see me.

[bd476]

This is great news about stopping the spread of illness, but it does nothing to help me with this two week long aaCHOOO! problem I have now. :(

[bd476]

blackdog said: "That's cool but what does that have to do with viruses? Since a virus is about 1/100th the size of a germ or bacterium, I suppose the reporter might want to ask a follow up question?"

This is only a theory, but I believe the physical principle behind saline spray is that because it is a supersaturated saline solution, the saline solution is absorbed by osmosis through the cellular walls of a virus cell, thus either killing the virus cell or preventing its ability to reproduce.

[Kiss Me Hardy]

NYC.

[Mr. Jeeves]

This stuff seems to work pretty well for me. It's made with Xylitol instead of saline solution and you can find it in health food stores: Xlear Nasal Wash.

Number one cold/flu resistance technique for me? Drink as little tap water as possible. I'm convinced the cholrination/flouridation weakens your immune system and makes you more vulnerable to virus attacks. Do all the hand washing and hand sanitizing stuff, too, but drink distilled water during the winter and you'll be sick less often, and get milder symptoms when you do get sick.

[Robert_Paulson2]

for the past five years... they DO still get the virus...
regardless of your assertion.

and it DOES cause the disease in folk who would otherwise NOT be exposed. It's pharmaceutical scam.

[Robert_Paulson2]

similar results are obtained by taking raw apple cider dissolved in water. Acidifying the blood over a period of hours, makes the cell walls of virii and bacterium very vulnerable... and reproduction, far less likely.

Most americans NEVER drink enough fluids to stay well.
8-10 glasses a day of water. NOT diet pepsi, not beer, not wine, not coke... but water. WHAT you drink above and beyond that does not matter so much as the initial gallon or two of water.

one of many health problems we bring upon ourselves...
food that does not nourish and fluids that do not irrigate the system.

flu season makes it hyper critical we get it right.

[neverdem]

A virion, i.e. an elementary viral particle, is composed of either a DNA or RNA core surrounded by a protein covering called a capsid. It has no cell wall. It penetrates another cell, bacterium, animal or plant cell, merges its core with its host's genetic material, and directs it to make more copies or the virus, often, maybe always, to the point where it literally bursts the host cell.

IIRC, the saline solution decreases the number of droplets(bioaerosols) formed during sneezing or coughing apparently by the effect on surface tension in the secretions of the respiratory tract.

[bd476]

Thank you, Robert, that's right about fluids. It's funny how easy it is to forget this simple principle in our busy lifestyles today. If I drink water first in the morning, then drink my favorite caffeinated beverage I have more energy than if I go straight for the java first. Caffeine dehydrates.

You have also reminded me of an old book I read in grade school. I loved science back then, too, ookay, okay I've always been a geek, LOL.

It was Folk Medicine by Dr. D.C. Jarvis. Folk Medicine

[bd476]

Oops, I stand corrected - no cell. However, DNA and RNA are both strands of nucleic acids which could be affected adversely by a supersaturated saline solution, yes? I'm sincerely asking here. :)

[Ditter]

On any given year there are a number of flu viruses out there. The flu shot only protects you from one or two of the most prevalent ones. It is still possible to come down with the flu after getting the flu vaccine but if you catch one, it is one that you were not protected against. The flu virus in the vaccine is dead, it does not make you sick.