Flu|The zinc user should take into account the screen’s inadequacy and possible side effects, says the author of the research review.
Flu patients often grab zinc tablets as medicine, but there is still no certainty about their effectiveness.
It appeared at the end of last week A Cochrane reviewaccording to which zinc can shorten the duration of the flu, but the evidence for this is weak.
The review brings together the research results on the topic and uses disciplined methods to weigh the evidence of treatment effectiveness.
In the light of the screen, zinc may shorten the symptoms by about two days. In the studies, the flu lasted an average of one week in the placebo-treated subjects.
Zinc taken preventively prevents the onset of the disease little or not at all.
Based on the research, it remains unclear whether zinc alleviates the intensity of the symptoms. However, the treated patients experienced side effects more often than the placebo patients.
The most common complaints were stomach symptoms, nausea and a bad taste in the mouth.
Zinc too users should take into account the incompleteness of the screen and possible side effects, says the review’s lead author Daryl Nault from the University of Maryland in the bulletin.
“Ultimately, it is up to the patient to decide whether they want to take the risk of unpleasant side effects in order to perhaps shorten the illness by a couple of days.”
According to the report, the evidence of the drug’s effectiveness is weak or very weak. The review included 34 studies. Their methods and results varied widely.
In some studies, it was not sufficiently explained how the test subjects were selected for the study and comparison groups. Then the differences in the treatment results may be due to the differences between the groups and not to the treatment.
In some studies, zinc was dosed in a variety of ways. The flu and its symptoms were also defined in many ways.
Usually flu refers to upper respiratory infections caused by viruses, which can include nasal congestion, runny nose, sore throat, cough, fatigue and fever.
Flus get better on their own, but they have a large disease burden, because they get sick often. That is why we are trying to find cures and preventions.
Zinc has been found to inhibit the multiplication of viruses in laboratory experiments. It cannot be concluded from that alone that the substance does the same thing in the human body.