The only time I have gargled with warm saltwater is after dental work. And that was more of sloshing in my mouth than a gargle.

My best cure for a sore throat is a large Tom Yum with shrimp.

I do it every time and find it effective.

I used to do this as a kid when I got sore throats. These days it’s very rare that I’ll get a sore throat. I don’t get sick often, but when I do it’s usually coughing and sneezing maybe a fever—Herbal tea and DayQuil seems to work well for that.

This is a good reminder though. I’m sorry this happened to you, but glad you were able to eventually get some relief. I hope it didn’t spoil the entire trip.

@gorillapaws the sore throat happed as the ship started heading back towards Tierra del Fuego from Antarctica. Fun 2½ days crossing Drake Passage (6 – 8 meter waves). Tossed that ship around like a canoe. HA! Luckily I recovered enough to drink water freely. I got pretty dehydrated. In a 5 hour layover in the Buenos Aires airport I was able to get down 2 liters of water. That felt so good.

@gondwanalon that sounds like an incredible adventure…

I use to alternate warm salt water gargle and warm water with honey in it.

@gorillapaws Here’s a 5 minute video of some pictures I took and my wife and I doing the Penguin Plunge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIhFKdX5K2I&t=40s

When I was a kid. I haven’t done it in years.

Let’s see if I have this correctly. You had a terrible sore throat and left your cabin to go to a bar? That doesn’t sound like something the ship would approve of.

Did your sore throat (1) go away after the salt water and within 12 hours you started getting congested? Or, (2) did you have a high fever and wound up diagnosed with strep? If it’s choice number one, your sore throat was probably near its end anyway.

I hope you flew with a mask on.

@JLeslie I would imagine that the actual physician would have been aware of the possibility of contagion and likely would have advised @gondwanalon appropriately.

@canidmajor I actually wouldn’t count on that. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people say, “the doctor says it’s not contagious” and it went around my store where I worked or I hear of several people in the community having the same thing. Plus, we don’t know what the doctor said.

How can a severe, persistent, sore throat not be contagious? It’s either strep, mono, rhinovirus, or a coronavirus. Number ten pain to swallow is usually strep, but it can be something else. Strep needs to be treated with antibiotics. A cold that starts with a sore throat, the sore throat is usually a very contagious time, it’s the first 48 hours of symptoms. Actually, no matter what, it sounds like he was in the midst of his first few days of symptoms.

We aren’t talking about a sore throat from sleeping in a heated room and it goes away as soon as he drinks something. He could barely eat or drink.

Yes.

I have, however I don’t always find it very helpful. I think throat tea helps me better.

Yes, I’ve used warm salt water for most of the last 72 years & it works wonders!!! I don’t get sore throats very often, but it is what I use when needed because I know I shouldn’t be going out to the drug store. That’s all we had to use before antibiotics were invented. Once the big pharma came up with an alternative, doctors quit recommending it because big pharma was paying them a kickback to say it was an “old wife’s tale” so people would go out & buy their products!!! Warm salt water inhaled up the nostrils will also help stop sinus infections. It’s a bit uncomfortable to do, but it works!!!

I don’t. I’ve heard about that for clearing out nasal passages and even bought a saline nasal flush thing when I was going through a bad allegic season…but I never ended up using it. It sits unopened under my bathroom sink because I just can’t imagine using it. It gives me the heebie jeebies.

Generally, a Halls lozange works fine for me.

If I test positive for Strep; I’m not using warm salt water gargles, I’ve seen three people with post Strep infections die, all three from heart conditions !

I’ll take antibiotics.

^^Exactly! I personally know two people with heart damage from strep.

I have my doubts this is strep, since the strep sore throat usually persists like swallowing glass for many days if not weeks, but I do know someone who had a not so severe sore throat and barely an elevated temperature drag out, she was at the two week mark when I was with her. I told her she has to get a culture. Strep usually has a fever, but her temp was still less than 100. She had done a quick strep test originally (negative) and it wound up being strep with the culture. Rhinovirus and coronavirus sore throats are usually short lived and then convert to congestion. Anything can happen though, these things don’t always follow a normal pattern.

@JLeslie I went to see the ship doctor with no mask on. I told the doctor that I had a very sore throat and asked if she had throat spray. She said that she only had prescription lozenges. I thanked the doctors and left with no mask on. There was no mention of a mask or that I should wear one. The doctor did not test me for Strep throat. Therefore there is no way of knowing that I had Strep Throat.

As you know, cold and flu viruses can also cause a sore throat. Since I wasn’t tested then we don’t know.

Also when I went to the ship’s bar at 1:20 am, I told the bar tender that I have a sore throat when I asked him to make me a glass of warm salty water to gargle with. He gave me the salt water and directed me to use the mens room. Again, no mention of a mask at all.

In the six airports that I went through hardly anyone wore masks. But I wore a mask some of the time, especially when I had to cough or sneeze.

I’m thinking that I just had a bad cold. Other symptoms included: mild fever, chills and lots and lots of sputum (crap from my lungs) and a very runny nose. But the sore throat was absolutely the worst part as it prevented me from drinking adequate water or eating form December 18 through December 21, 2023.

I recovered quickly when I finally got home on 12–22-22.

I very rarely catch colds (it’s been many years). I haven’t had the flu since 1979.

I was exposed to many hundreds of people from all over the world going through 6 airports and 6 plane flight and stuck on a ship with about 400 passengers and crew for 9 days. When I do catch a cold I always recover quickly and completely.

Strep doesn’t have congestion.

If you had a fever I think you most likely had covid. Most adults don’t get a fever with rhinovirus. Whatever you had I think you were contagious for a few days.

I think everyone should be wearing masks when traveling on planes, I don’t mean some sort of mandate, I know Americans have no tolerance for that, but it should be encouraged. Masks when traveling means more likely to arrive healthy and not spread around illness when we are with family, friends, and while on vacations.

The last time i had a really bad sore throat, I tested positive for Covid. The sore throat was like knives in my throat.

I do for minor sore throats. Though I find Throat Coat tea more helpful.

@jca2 My sore throat from covid was the worst sore throat of my life. Felt like someone had flayed a whole layer off.

I have used warm salt water to gargle with. Salt is a good disinfectant and can kill many germs. Warm water and gargling also helps to break loose/wash away any phlegm that might be coating your throat, protecting the germs and helping them to thrive.

@JLeslie Probably a good idea to wear a mask in airports and on planes. Most people are just kidding themselves when they wear their mast ineffectually with huge gaps.

Covid-19 was highly unlikely. Since My lungs generated huge amounts of sputum (filled a couple vomit bags with tissue saturated with sputum and snot). I had 4 Covid-19 vaccine shots.

@gondwanalon I disagree that it couldn’t have been covid. Your symptoms sound like a lot of people with covid19.

It might have been a different coronavirus, that’s another possibility.

People who had all 5 possible shots are still catching covid19.

Whatever it was, it certainly sounds contagious for at least a few days. I’m surprised the ship’s doctor didn’t quarantine you to your cabin and it sounds like he didn’t test you for covid. On a ship I don’t think it matters what you have, I think they generally try to quarantine sick people.

@JLeslie Thank you for your responses.
Looks like the official symptoms for Covid-19 have very recently changed to include a productive cough. It was my understanding that Covid-19 symptoms included a non-production cough. As I said, my coughs were very productive. Very cold-like.
Also I had no loss of smell or taste. No shortness of breath. No diarrhea. No vomiting.

Previous Covid-19 symptoms emphasized a “non-productive cough” and loss of smell and taste. Looks like the official symptoms now include cold and flu symptoms.

Even if I had Covid-19, a rapid Covid-19 test specimen from my nonstop runny nose would have very likely generated a negative result. The virus titer would have been greatly diluted with snot. HA!

Stay healthy and strong!

@gondwanalon I think maybe you aren’t talking to a lot of people who have had Covid19 lately.

Plus, even in 2020 some people had no symptoms and some had deadly symptoms, and there was everything in-between.

Some of the first very public cases in 2020 was Mayor Suarez in Miami who mostly had a “head cold” and then months later the mayor of Atlanta who also mostly had a head cold with lots of congestion.

People, and the media, focused on not breathing, because the people who had trouble breathing the symptom often progressed very quickly, so it was important to get medical attention.

Omicron seems to not affect the lungs as much as Delta in most people and especially now that people are vaccinated it seems to help.

I’m glad you feel better, I know you take health very seriously, and I’m not trying to lecture if it sounds that way. I’m just hoping if anyone sees this thread they realize that “a cold” often is covid19 and to do the test, or at least wear a mask or stay away from people.

My dad has sinus troubles, and winter colds often last him 2–3 weeks of continued sinus drainage. When he became sick two months ago he blamed allergies from raking leaves. He does have mold and dust allergies. I told him to test for covid19. He wouldn’t. He didn’t think it could be covid. Then my mom got sick 2 or 3 days later, she had some sore throat and laryngitis and then congestion. I told her to test. She told me it’s just a cold. I berated them to test, because my dad is TERRIFIED of covid, and I felt pretty sure they had covid and this could ease his fears. My mom finally succumbed to my pressure and tested and it was positive. My dad tested, and they both thought it would be too many days already, and his was positive, and I don’t see how your congestion would have been worse than his.

In the end, I personally just don’t want to catch anything if I can avoid it, so if someone is sick I just prefer they distance from me. Cold, flu, covid, whatever. If I got sick I’d want to know if it’s COVID, because I too wonder if I will have a mild case or wind up in the hospital. If I had a mild case I would feel liberated from my concerns about it.

@JLeslie I’m sorry that your parents have had to deal with Covid-19.
The SARS-CoV-2 virus is deadly and crippling. We all likely have stories to tell.

I had plenty of time to think about what was happening to me while I was dealing with cold-like symptoms. I wondered if I could be suffering from Covid-19. I thought that since I was generating lots of sputum and could smell and taste then I’m most likely dealing with a cold. In the past I always had Chloraseptic spray to control a sore throat. But I was trapped on a ship in which my sore throat raged unchecked without anything useful to stop it (until I remembered about gargling with salt water). That’s why my sore throat was so sore.

Strange that after nearly 3 years the “non-productive cough” Covid-19 symptom has suddenly been eliminated.

I had convinced myself (and am still pretty sure) that I was dealing with a common cold virus. Again, since there were no tests, then there are no results and you and I are just guessing.

“If you don’t test, then you don’t know.” -Dr. Jerry Mixon

^^ I heard today that there very well might be another new strain of the virus. Maybe that’s why the abrupt change in symptoms. As of 01/05/2023, no one coming from China will be allowed to fly into the US either direct or via another country without testing negative within 2 days of their flight. Apparently China has flooded Italy with sick passengers.

@gondwanalon The virus is indeed intriguing. It is really hard to know what is going on right now with such a great variety of symptoms. It’s weird.

^^^^^^Gargling won’t get the SPAM taste out of your mouth

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