U.S. health officials on Tuesday warned consumers to stop using Zicam nasal cold remedy products because they can cause the loss of a sense of smell.
The specific products contained in the warning include Zicam Cold Remedy Nasal Gel, Zicam Cold Remedy Nasal Swabs, and Zicam Cold Remedy Swabs Kids’ Size.
— Read more at FDA Issues Warning for Over-the-Counter Cold Remedy at MSN. Many thanks to rusticdove for the link!
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Oh my gosh, a friend of mine was JUST telling me about someone she knows who used a homeopathic nasal spray that completely, irreversibly fried her nasal passages, and she can no longer smell (or taste much of anything either — and she’s a chef, or was, at any rate). I wonder if this is what she used?
aw geeze….I can’t imagine a worse thing to happen to a chef! How devastating! Hopefully time will see some improvement.
Oh, how terrible!
God, that’s scary. But I have never put anything up my nose – not for recreation nor remedy!
It is scary…
Oh no! I’ve used Zicam a few times, my mom introduced me to it.
This is really too bad because the few times I’ve used the Zicam nasal swabs (which you dab just inside your nostrils) they *actually worked*. Which is astounding. (They helped me avoid getting a cold when I thought I was coming down with one, and they rushed me through what would have been a major cold.)
No, no, no.
Oh well. I will not endanger my sense of smell, just to get rid of a cold. Darn.
Oh dear, luckily nothing bad happened! Do tell your Mom though.
Yep, I just emailed my mom (and my dad, for good measure) scary!
I had the same results, prox, but now hearing this, I’ll gladly suffer through a cold as long as I can maintain my sense of smell…and taste for that matter. That poor woman who is/was a chef! That’s a nightmare. You know, I remember hearing that Michael Hutchence (late lead singer of INXS) tripped on a sidewalk and hit his head on the curb and lost most of his sense of smell and taste after that. How cruel.
Well, I”m tossing the Nasonex just in case! I have noticed that immediately after using it (which is only occasionally) I can’t smell much of anything for a little while….eek!
Daisy, I think your Nasonex is probably okay, totally different type of drug. I’d check the drug info or ask your doctor just to be sure, but don’t let your allergies ruin your smell either!
Agree. I don’t think it was the mode of delivery that was the problem.
whew!
The principle behind homeopathy has always bothered me. The theory is that you stimulate your system to fight off whatever ails you (infections and other conditions) by deliberately inducing the effect, on a smaller scale, of whatever you want to eliminate. The treatment reproduces the disease, generally by applying or ingesting a substance (sometimes even poisons), heavily diluted, that causes a condition mimicking the problem. So to cure a sinus irritation, you deliberately cause a sinus irritation. The problem seems to be that the substance (zinc) was applied in too high a concentration, and caused damage to the sinus cavity that was much greater than the damage caused by a cold. This may be because there is no very safe level of zinc to inhale; it may also be because people thought that if one dose is good, two is better. And who knows whether this stuff was regulated. I feel so bad for that chef; hope after time it all comes back.
There seems to be some disagreement about whether Zicam is really a homeopathic remedy at all, although I know the company uses that term in their marketing.
That’s interesting.
My understanding of homeopathy is that is it almost a “ghost” of the substance. I wouldn’t put Zicam in that category at all.
I think the company has actually been aware of the possibility of permanent anosmia for a while. I took a Sensation and Perception class in college about two and a half years ago, and we discussed this happening with Zicam. I guess it’s just become enough of an issue to recall the product. I’ll stick to my vitamin c/zinc supplements when I feel that cold coming on…very scary.
As I understand it, they’re planning to challenge the FDA:
http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2009/06/16/zicam-the-fda-and-homeopathy/
Very interesting. Even if they win the ruling, I bet a lot of the damage will have been done in scaring consumers away from this product. 130 cases does seem like a lot to be trying to talk down though…we’ll see.
Agree…hard to see how you can recover from that.
You’re kidding–they actually knew about cases of anosmia, and they kept selling it??!! They should be put out of business for that.
Yeah, I think most drug companies keep track of adverse reactions but it’s only when they hit a certain point that they take action. They always assume that a certain number are due to chance (i.e. some poor soul who’s genetically wired to lose their sense of smell with the wrong chemical exposure) and then have to do some level of analysis to see what actually is happening. It’s a weird and complicated business- and a profitable one. We’ll see what happens.
A lot of people use this product, and a fair number of those use it preventatively; that’s a lot of Zicam. All of my daughter’s teachers at elementary school use it throughout the cold season; they all recommended it to me (my daughter’s first year at school, she came down with eight colds in twelve weeks).
Homeopathic “remedies” are so thoroughly diluted that a dose almost certainly doesn’t contain a single molecule of the substance it’s named after. I won’t bore you with the details but the Wikipedia page on homeopathy contains some relevant math. (A standard 30C dilution is the equivalent of one millilitre of a substance diluted in 264 quintillion quintillion quintillion gallons of water: a cube over 105 light years on each side. By way of comparison, the orbit of Pluto would fit into a cube about 10 light hours to the side.)
Zicam, however, contains more than a homeopathic dilution of zinc. There’s no absolute proof that zinc in the oronasal cavities (whether a nasal spray or lozenges) causes anosmia, but there’s evidence that zinc ions can damage the olfactory epithelium. So: no zinc for me!
Thanks!
Many thanks for the math, Pyramus (which goes far to demonstrate how “effective” such a “remedy” could be, anyway). So that may be why there is debate over whether Zicam is homeopathic–it actually has a measurable quantity of an active ingredient. And I don’t want anyone messing with my olfactory epithelium, either!
Chicken soup– there’s your cold remedy.
Yep.
A chef without smell? Ouch. I hope her nasal passages and sense of smell return.
The FDA warning is good to know about, my allergist is always trying to get me on nasal sprays and I just don’t feel comfortable using them.
Well, again, I don’t think it’s any sort of blanket reason not to use nasal sprays. We depend on Nasonex in my house!
When i used Nasonex last winter (btw its called Nasorex here in Europe),I lost my sense of smell for 3 weeks.I was so scared! And then I read that one of the side effects is sudden change in menstrual cycle,because it contain hormones.It’s not recommended for children under 15 but they can get a prescription at the doctors office anyway!
Oh dear, that is scary!
I was shocked when I came across this report yesterday and of course, I was compelled to pass it along to this forum.
Thanks RusticDove!
I was t-boned by a car on my bike a few years back. Besides the broken cheek bone, nose and hand; the most painful thing is what it did temporarily to my sense of smell.
I hit the ground so hard that my brain severed it’s connection to my nasal cavity.
“Don’t know what you got… till it’s gone”
Luckily, through some determination, surgery and a large dose of luck according to my ENT. I have gotten it back.
Living without your sense of is terrible. It’s like losing a loved one.
I feel for those victims of this product. The people that knew and let this product go out into the market should be forced to snort drano.
Oh, lucky you to get your sense of smell back after your ordeal!