Evidence of shortening the duration of the disease

For people who are already sick, zinc supplements may be able to reduce the duration of a cold to some extent. However, the data are weak.

Anyone searching on the internet “Zinc and cold” Searches and immediately comes across one Countless nutritional supplements. How effective it is in preventing and treating the common cold has been the subject of heated debate for a long time. Authors from the independent Cochrane Scientific Network have now evaluated the results of 34 studies on preventing or treating the common cold and in one study General study (“Review”) Collected.

what Preventive intake Of zinc, the Cochrane team found “No evidence”, Zinc can protect against colds“, writes the German magazine aerzteblatt.de. The authors themselves carefully put it this way in their summary of their findings: “Compared with placebo, the use of zinc may have little or no effect in cold prevention.” It is also possible that zinc as a preventative measure has little or no effect on the duration of a cold and perhaps little or no effect on the severity of symptoms.

Investigation results vary when it comes to: Take zinc for treatment after symptoms appear It goes: “Using zinc to treat the common cold It may reduce the duration of symptoms by about two days compared to placebo“, write the authors. It was exactly 2.37 days. This result was based on calculations with data from eight studies and 972 participants.

However, the study teamLittle confidence in the evidencewhich supports this conclusion.” On the one hand, this is due to a lack of information about the methods by which study participants were recruited. Second, the way in which zinc was administered was quite different. Furthermore, studies have not been able to prove the presence of any Effect of zinc on the severity of cold symptoms.

Meanwhile, the Cochrane team points out that when taking zinc to treat the common cold Undesirable effects are more frequent It has been reported compared to treatment with a placebo (placebo) without any active ingredient. It happened often Changes in the sense of taste And Stomach problems on me.