Natrum Muriaticum: Homeopathic Pediculicide

Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
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I couldn’t figure out where the best place for this would be, but Cecil wrote on it (link), so I thought I’d try here.

It’s no big surprise to find homeopathic stuff in a “new-age” shop, but it always amazes me to see it in a “mainstream” store. [Another is Zicam–here’s a recent thread) Yesterday, I was in Fred Meyer (sort of like a K-mart, for those of you not in the Great Northwest) and saw a product called Lice Freee! (their website). It was right there next to the lice products that actually contain a pesticide. [By the way, I was buying antiseptic wash, which just happened to be near the delousing section.]

This stuff lists its ‘active’ ingredient as “Natrum Muriaticum 1X (Sodium Chloride USP).” For those of you not familiar with the technical terminology, that is table salt. It is apparently in some sort of gel base, but it’s just salt. And yet the stuff was being sold for $15.99, which is about a buck more than all the othe lice things there. Of course, it truthfully claims to be non-toxic.

To be fair, the box did contain two 4-ounce containers of the ‘remedy,’ two application caps, and a stainless steel nit comb. That comb is of better quality than the plastic ones in many of the other boxes on the shelf, which is a good thing, since the comb is probably the only thing that might do anything about lice.

The directions say you can put the stuff on dry hair, wear the cap for an hour, then comb out the dead lice and nits (it doesn’t say what to do with the ones that are still alive, which would be most of them, I believe). I don’t know how the homeopathic Law of Similars applies, unless a lot of salt makes lice immortal, so a little salt makes them dies. And actually, ‘1X’ is 10%, so it isn’t diluted like most homeopathic potions.

Anyhow, I just wanted to tell someone that this stupid product is out there. Maybe I should have just written this in the Pit.

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What’s weird here is that there’s not even a homeopathic justification for this stuff – what does salt have to do with lice? “Small white things”? Law of Similars be damned!

On the other hand, 10% is a LOT of salt; Hell, maybe the osmosis kills 'em!

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For many people, homeopathic has the connotation of “non-traditional” and from this they conclude “more natural and therefore having less side effects.” What can you do?

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Maybe it simply works–theoretically, I mean–by suffocating the live lice with the gel, rather than the salt or “Law of Similars” having anything to do with it.

The Harvard School of Public Health, which has evidently done some kind of preliminary study, say that they have no real data yet as to all the other suffocating agents, like peanut butter and mayonnaise, but that they did immerse some live head lice in olive oil (olive oil being one of the most popular home remedies) to see what happened. Those that were immersed for one hour survived, those that were immersed for two hours did not. (It’s on Page 10.)

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/headlice/liceNO.pdf

They also point out that you don’t need goop or chemicals at all–if you comb the hair thoroughly every day with a nit comb to remove the live lice that have just hatched out, until it’s been two weeks since you saw a live louse, you can disrupt the cycle and get rid of them that way. They point out helpfully that there are usually “fewer than a dozen” active lice on the head at any one time.

And “use magnification and illumination”, they add. And “distract the child with a video”.

Uh huh. :rolleyes: A lonnnnnng video.

It’s on Page 8.

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Hey, getting head lice off a child is a hell of a lot easier than getting ear mites off a cat.

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Passing this, this morning, I just realized that “Natrum Muriaticum” is woo-woo-speak for “sodium chloride”. “Natrum” = “soda”. “Muriatic acid” is a trivial name for “hydrochloric acid”.

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Yeah, I think I object to the pseudo-scientific Latin obfuscation of the active ingredient most of all. Heck, it may work, by poisoning the bugs with too much salt, or by just suffocating them. But the company that makes it wants you to think they’re using some sort of alchemical product, so that you’ll pay the extra money for their stuff. Which is one of the several things wrong with homeopathy in general.

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First of all, I want to mention that this thread brought me to Cecil’s critique of Homeopathy in general. I was profoundly disappointed in Cecil for dismissing Homeopathy so quickly. For someone who seems to have an open mind, I was shocked.

As for the ‘pseudo-scientific Latin obfuscation’ - all Homeopathic remedies have these sorts of names. It’s just too bad we don’t learn latin anymore.

PLEASE, PLEASE make the distinction between ‘pop’ homeopathy like this lice crap, and classically administered Homeopathy by a Homeopathic doctor. The new wave of ‘pop’ homeopathy is mostly based on combination remedies. Putting low potency doeses of various remedies together to reach a broader range of symptoms. One of the main tenents of Homeopathy is to get the one correct remedy for the individual - combination remedies deviate from this principle. Most true Homeopaths don’t use combination remedies at all. Most combination remedies are more ‘symptom relief’ then actual Homeopathy - that cures the ailment. Like daily St. John’s Wart TV commercials give classical Chinese herbal medicine a bad name, so does ‘pop’ homeopathy like this lice garbage give true homeopathy a bad name.

Another point, true Homeopathy does not kill anything, period. Even parasites like lice. The proper remedy would work by telling your body to change itself enough to make you less tasty to the lice, or fleas. They might starve, die and fall off, or simply leave. But Homeopathy does not directly kill anything.

Saltire, can you explain your point about homeopathy using ‘some sort of alchemical product’ to increase the cost? If you stay away from the combination remedies, ALL homepathic medicine costs around $5-$10 - for dozens of doses! Compared to ‘modern’ medicine, homeopathy is obscenely cheap. (and you wonder by drug companies haven’t jumped on the Homeopathic band-wagon - no profit to be had.) Also, all remedies that I’ve ever seen are only labeled with the Latin name of the substance, and information about the base (some inert substance). The point of homeopathy is that you’re getting a pure substance, so I’m not sure what you’re talking about.

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The point of homeopathy is that you’re getting water. Kind of hard to give THAT a bad name.

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That comment was directed at the product I mentioned, and it’s referring to table salt as ‘natrum muriaticum.’ This is an obvious attemt to make people think the stuff should be expensive, since it is expensive. Whereas most people who thought about it would object to paying $16 for a glass of salt water. I think that is also the reason why homeopaths use Latin so much: To convince the uneducated that their remedies have extra legitimacy because of the fancy name (not that other remedies don’t do the same, but they use medical terminology (sodium chloride), rather than their own super-obscure terms (natrum muriaticum)). It’s simple Snake-Oil 101.

Before you continue, I suggest you search this forum for old homeopathy threads. There were several, and some were lengthy. You can expect to hear the same arguements here, so be prepared with actual facts to counter them, if you intend to do so.

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On rereading the thread:
dies=die
attemt=attempt
arguements=arguments

Sorry.

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John W. Kennedy, there is now a shot for animal earmites. My ferrets got it last year, and it worked great.

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akrako1 said:

Pop psychology. The current alt med wave (in this country, at least) has everyone jumping on the “natural must be better” bandwagon. Anything that’s “traditional” or “alternative” or “holistic” has got to be better than conventional health care. So the marketing departments have caught wind of this trend, and are trying to use this, as they do with everything. Thus “homeopathic” is just a buzz word for “buy our product”.

Now question for you: do you contest any of Cecil’s description? You’ve already stated you disagree with his opinion, but what about the facts he states?

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One particularly annoying example of this is the recent trend to call water “aqua” in many products. A lot of shampoos, e.g., are doing this now. So the marketing geniuses have an ingredient list that starts: “Ingredients: Water (aqua), …”

-mok