Garlic

I have just the thing for that cold … Garlic

Taking garlic to prevent or treat colds requires some serious trade-offs. Is it better to smell terrible and be accused of excessive paranoia about avoiding vampires or to have the occasional cough and cold? The average adult has two to four colds a year. Will garlic stave off those days lost to sniffling and suffering?

In a comprehensive review of scientific trials of garlic, only one of the five studies identified was considered to be of good enough quality to give us any definitive answers about garlic. Remember, we need to use high-quality research to determine whether the results are trustworthy. In the one good study of garlic, 146 volunteers were randomly assigned to take a garlic supplement every day for twelve weeks or to take a placebo pill. Interestingly enough, the volunteers who were taking garlic had significantly fewer colds than the volunteers who were taking the placebo. The garlic group also had fewer days of illness overall, but the number of days it took for people to recover from their illnesses was the same for both groups. Garlic just might work! Of course, those taking garlic did have some side effects; they reported more rashes and, not surprisingly, having a bad odor. Hmm. It really does come down to bad smell versus fewer colds.

Because this is just one study, the verdict on garlic is still out. This is not a lot of evidence as to whether garlic really does prevent or treat colds. While this one relatively small study suggests that garlic might prevent your getting colds, this needs to be studied again and again, and in more people, in order to determine if garlic really works.

There may be another important consideration to take into account when deciding whether you want to start taking garlic. While we cannot find any studies to prove or disprove this, it seems likely that reeking like garlic might decrease your chances of getting lucky. That’s right—people may not want to sleep with someone who stinks. This just might outweigh the benefits of the garlic because not having sex could make you more vulnerable to colds. In a study that closely examined the immune systems of men who had to spend periods of time either masturbating or not masturbating, scientists found that sexual arousal and orgasms increased the number of certain immune cells. The natural killer cells, which are an important part of your body’s immune system, came out to the bloodstream when the volunteers were aroused or having orgasms. Getting lucky might improve the function of your immune system!

Garlic may help to prevent or shorten colds, but we would advise careful consideration of the pros and cons while we wait for more data about how well garlic works. If you have a partner with a poor sense of smell, you may want to go ahead and grab some garlic.