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Consider Taking Zinc Every Time You Travel - LessWrong

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Zinc lozenges are pretty well established to prevent or shorten the duration of colds. People are more likely to get colds while travelling, especially if doing so by plane and/or to a destination full of other people who also travelled by plane. I have a vague sense you shouldn’t take zinc 100% of the time, but given the risks it might make sense to take zinc prophylactically while travelling. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Zinc_pills.jpgHow much does zinc help? Cochrane review says it shortens colds by 33%, and that’s implied to be for people who waited until they were symptomatic to take it: taken preemptively I’m going to ballpark it at 50% shorter (including some colds never coming into existence at all). This is about 4 days, depending on which study you ask. [Note: only a few forms of Zinc work for this. You want acetate if possible, gluconate if not, and it needs to be a lozenge, not something you swallow. Zinc works by physically coating your throat to prevent infection, it’s not a nutrient in this case. You need much more than you think to achieve the effect, the brand I use barely fits in my tiny mouth.] Some risk factors for illness in general are “being around a lot of people”, “poor sleep” and “poor diet”. These factors compound: being around people who have been around a lot of people, or who have poor sleep or diet, is worse than being around a lot of well-rested, well-fed hermits. Travel often involves all of these things, especially by air and especially for large gatherings like conferences and weddings (people driving to camp in the wilderness: you are off the hook). I struggled to find hard numbers for risk of infection during travel. It’s going to vary a lot by season, and of course covid has confused everything. Hocking and Foster gives a 20% chance of catching a cold after a flight during flu season, which seems high to me, but multiple friends reported a 50% chance of illness after travel, so fill in your own number here. Mine i

x Consider Taking Zinc Every Time You Travel — LessWrong Health / Medicine / Disease Practical Frontpage 51 Consider Taking Zinc Every Time You Travel by Elizabeth 1st Oct 2021 Aceso Under Glass 3 min read 44 51 Edit (November 2022): comments raised some probably valid concerns about my sources. I also don't currently believe it's possible to buy the kind of zinc lozenges studied; they're too unpleasant, what you buy in a drug store has been changed for palatability. Zinc lozenges are pretty well established to prevent or shorten the duration of colds. People are more likely to get colds while

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