Stop Taking Echinacea & Goldenseal for Colds!
Stop Taking Echinacea and Goldenseal for Colds!
Host: Cat Ellis “Herbal Prepper Live”
I know, this is sort of like sacrilege to some home remedy enthusiasts, but please, stop taking echinacea and goldenseal for colds! For whatever reason this combination of herbs has become famous as a cold remedy. The only problem is- it doesn’t work.
Actually, that’s not the only problem. Not only doesn’t this combination work, but:
- It is a horrible waste of a limited resource (goldenseal).
- It is a misuse, on many levels, of both echinacea and goldenseal herbs.
- This will dry out your mucus membranes, which is opposite of what your body needs.
- There are other, legitimate uses for this combination which go unexplored.
Goldenseal is endangered in the wild, largely due to its popularity as an “herbal antibiotic”. As such, it is often this combination and belief that it will help in the quick recover of a cold. Since the common cold is not a bacteria, but a virus, antibiotics are not appropriate. This is a misunderstanding that has crossed over from a bad practice in biomedicine to over-prescribe antibiotics.
Echinacea is an immunostimulant and a potent antiviral. However, for it to be effective, it must be taken it frequent doses at the first sign of a cold. By frequent, I mean once ever hour you are awake. However, if you were to do so with a combined tincture of echinacea and goldenseal, this would dry out the mucus membranes quickly. Goldenseal, when taken early in a respiratory infection, tends to work as an astringent, drying up the mucus membranes.
Goldenseal does have topical, antibacterial properties, but it is not a systemic antibiotic. Goldenseal, or any other berberine-containing herb, and echinacea make a good combination for a throat spray or topical wound treatment.
There are definitely better uses for this combination, as well as more sustainable choices than goldenseal for berberine. Listen to this episode on to hear what you could be taking for your cold, and how to put goldenseal
Herbal Prepper Website: http://www.herbalprepper.com/
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