Couple of years ago, while I was in India I had bad throat and coughing. But I continued to buy cold water bottle and soda. My family back home kept complaining that drinking cold water and soda is the reason why I was coughing and not because of pollution or anything else. I disagreed because my thinking was that cold stuff by itself cannot make you sick. It is the bacterias and viruses that make you sick. The chances of bottled water and soda, having bacteria or virus in my opinion was low. So I finally visited a doctor who was supposed to be “old school” types :). But contrary to what i expected, he concurred with my thinking and told me that I can continue to have the cold soda and bottled water without any issues and he was not joking.
So here are some health related common beliefs that I suspect are primarily myths and not true. Add to this list if I missed any others.
Do you know if they are really myths or true? Please provide good scientific rationale and not just “I have heard from lot of people so it must be true” 🙂
1. Sudden change in weather can make people sick?
2. Going out in cold temperature without wearing sweater etc can make people sick? Especially small children?
3. When you have cold (runny nose etc), you shouldn’t drink cold stuff like ice cream, cold yogurt and such? What about banana?
4. When babies start teething they may get fever?
When babies start teething they may get fever?
In India they say when babies teeth they get sick with cold, loose motions,etc.
Doctors here don’t believe in it. But explanation is simple when they teeth they want to put everything in mouth, chew on anything that comes in their hand. This is because of the irritation caused by swollen gums. As a result they pick up many viruses from all over the place. And there you go you have a sick and irritated baby.
I hope that was scientific enough.
Great article Manish. Elders in India also told me recently not to drink cold drinks when I am having cough, etc. And also they said they did not want ice cream since they have cold. I also know of people getting cautious with cold weather and kids.
I mostly dont believe in all of the above.
When i suffered from cold when i was little, my mom gave me ice-creams as according to her i had heat- related cold ;). it worked or probably the cold took is course (4-5 days) and went away.
Yup.. I get those heat based cold as well. Having popsicle or chilled drinks helps it.
In US during labor and post delivery they give ice chips and that raises moms concern. While in hospital, you can order anything from menu where as traditional methods has various food restrictions.