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If you’ve ever wondered why some people get strep throat over and over and over again, sometimes even just days after a strep infection was supposedly eradicated with antibiotics, here’s the likely answer as explained by old-time MDs who practiced medicine before the modern love affair with prescription drugs got its start.
Most people are far too quick to run and get a prescription for antibiotics and never give their immune system a chance to build any resistance whatsoever. Most never consider the use of home remedies for strep throat either.
Conventional doctors today do a great job of scaring people out of their minds about the possibility of rheumatic fever/heart damage from allowing the body to deal with a strep throat infection unmedicated. However, the truth is, the risk of complications from strep throat is very small for healthy people who have no issues with their immune system. Even WebMD used to state (before pharmaceutical industry pressure forced a change in language to only mention antibiotics) that strep throat will go away on its own with or without treatment in 3-7 days.
I’ve written before about the one and only case of strep throat I ever had. It occurred when I was 15 and I am ever so grateful my MD father loved me enough to let me fight through it and win without antibiotics. The result? I’ve never ever gotten strep throat again despite repeated exposures. One exposure was in very close quarters – a college roommate had strep throat and I still didn’t contract it! What’s even more interesting is that none of my children have ever had strep either despite multiple exposures from friends and classmates.
I obviously built up a strong resistance to strep throat at a young age and have been blessed with never having to suffer with it again by allowing my body to fight through it naturally. It’s also quite possible I passed on my immunity to my children via breastfeeding, although that is obviously just an educated guess on my part.
The article I wrote on my personal strep throat story has invited both ridicule and applause over the past couple of years. Some folks have angrily emailed me saying I am crazy and putting people’s lives in danger by suggesting that forgoing meds for strep is the best way to go if one is in good health.
For others, the article triggered an “aha moment” with more than just a few deciding once and for all to stare down the strep throat demon and win!
One such inspiring story crossed my inbox recently and the strep throat victim was none other than professional singer Martin DeBourge!
Here’s what Martin had to say:
As a singer, getting strep throat every single year is not only frustrating, but vocally debilitating! So when it hit again this year, and I felt it coming on, I decided a new course of action was in order.
I spent a day researching. The one article that really rang true for me was on your website about whether antibiotics for strep are really necessary. You talked about how you “muscled through it” when you had strep throat as a teenager, and how your body may have even built an immunity against it.
That sounded great to me! But, I am well aware of the massive pain strep throat can cause. Just swallowing fluid is excruciating, let alone solid foods. So I needed a sort of “healthy second opinion”.
I called fellow friend and vocalist David Katz in New York. I knew he was an herbalist, but most importantly, he would understand my plight as a singer needing to do what’s best for my pipes. He runs a website and has an herbal product line JUST for singers, so I knew he was the right guy.
He ALSO encouraged me to steer clear of the antibiotics and gave me a few suggestions to “get through it”.
I braced myself for at least 10 days of bed ridden fever, throat swelling and sickness. Like I said, I’ve been through this numerous times before, so I knew what I was in for. I didn’t clear my singing schedule though, hoping for the best.
To my amazement, the strep “spots” started clearing within a couple days. I had my voice back in 36 hours! I was floored… and convinced.
Martin kept a daily log of his strep throat home remedies adventure outlined below. Hopefully, it will inspire more than just a few others to take the leap themselves.
Effective Strep Throat Home Remedies
Martin’s holistic strep throat treatment consisted of the following ingredients which he consumed at a rate of ½ teaspoon every 30 minutes to an hour.
- Use a mortar & pestle to mash up 3 cloves of fresh garlic (sources). If the raw garlic is too hot for you or you’re concerned about the odor potential, use homemade pickled garlic instead. Do not use commercial pickled garlic as it has no therapeutic value.
- Mix in half a teaspoon of cayenne pepper (sources).
- Mix in raw honey (manuka honey is the most potent. Be wary what brand you buy as most manuka honey is fake. Get UMF certified 15+) to taste which has healing properties of its own (sources).
Martin also gargled with raw apple cider vinegar diluted with some water 3x per day (sources). Although Martin didn’t use it, adding small cups of bone broth to the regimen would have helped speed healing as well.
Note that some people like to gargle with colloidal silver, which also works well. However, note that this remedy will kill the good bacteria in your throat area as well as the bad, potentially contributing to more problems down the road from unbalanced mouth, throat, and sinuses flora.
Below is Martin’s daily journal logging his progress to a cure.
Using Home Remedies for Strep Throat: A Daily Journal
10/6 – Sunday afternoon – felt “something” in throat. Still sang well at rehearsal.
10/7 – Monday morning – “something” became more prominent and I began the research into what I felt was inevitably the strep bacteria attacking my throat.
10/7 – Monday early afternoon – visit to doctor for regular checkup and asking about an unrelated pulled muscle. He checked my throat (routinely) and said nothing. It didn’t matter if he had, I would have just went through the motions of accepting an antibiotic prescription, but not taking it – I had already made up my mind to do something “different”.
10/7 – Monday afternoon – found information on The Healthy Home Economist about beating strep with no meds. Followed up with a phone call to David Aaron Katz. Became convinced that I will muscle through it with home remedies. As per David’s suggestion, I started by sucking/chewing on cloves of garlic – 5 of them before the day was out!
10/7 – Monday evening – attempted to sing. Did not go well, highs were very strained.
10/8 – Tuesday morning – throat uncomfortableness, but quick mirror check didn’t seem to reveal anything overly red. Driving son to school is when I looked in rear view mirror and noticed two white spots. Strep confirmed.
10/8 – Tuesday later morning – started a cycle of garlic chewing with a mixture of raw honey & cayenne pepper every half hour (concoction detailed below). First two administers I experienced upset stomach, but became very tired and slept most afternoon.
10/8 – Tuesday afternoon – continued garlic/honey/cayenne mixture every half hour during awake times.
10/8 – Tuesday early evening. Headaches persisted, but still had an appetite. Gargled with ACV – that was a bit painful.
10/8 – Tuesday evening. Continued with mixture until I went to sleep. Noticed a third spot very far back and lower behind the tongue. May have always been there, but this is the first I noticed.
10/9 – Wednesday early morning – Awoke with a sore throat, a bit difficult to swallow. Gargled and drank 16 fl oz water with 2 tbs of ACV & Raw Honey. Checked throat under light, saw the same three spots.
10/9 – Wednesday afternoon – no stomach issues, and the sore throat lessened considerably throughout the day. Still uncomfortable, but I can definitely eat.
10/9 – Wednesday early evening – third spot undetected, second one lessening. First one still prominent, but definitely all good signs. Also, I noticed I am not all that drained and exhausted – which I attributed to the garlic intake.
10/10 – Thursday early morning – woke up with slightly less of a sore throat. Gargled and drank 16oz water with ACV & Honey. Throat under light still shows the one stubborn spot, hard to tell, but it could be a tiny bit less in size.
10/11 – Thursday afternoon – Was told by my wife that she can’t bear with my garlic breath another day… no worries, that third spot is definitely reduced in size. I decided that come morning, I will just do Apple Cider Vinegar. Besides, I had a karaoke gig this night and needed to not smell like garlic for the customers.
10/12 – Friday Morning – Spot free. Wow. Not a single spot, throat back to normal. I decided to slowly warm up the voice as I had a singing engagement to prepare for on Saturday.
10/13 – Saturday evening – voice 100%. Throat clean as a whistle. In all my years (year after year) getting strep throat, I have NEVER bounced back this quick – not to mention getting through it without antibiotics.
10/15 – UPDATE: I made a facebook post about this a few days ago, simply saying that I kicked strep to the curb without the use of antibiotics. I have over 1400 followers on my profile, so I certainly expected varying comments. One particular comment jumped out at me… “make sure you really got rid of it, it typically comes back within a couple days if you didn’t eradicate it”.
Well……… it’s not back!
Congratulations Martin on the amazing success of your strep throat remedy! Please keep us updated on your progress, but my bet is that you won’t ever be taking antibiotics for strep throat again, and you may very well never even have it again!
Have you always wondered how to get rid of strep throat without meds? Have you ever muscled through it under your own power using one or more strep throat home remedies? If so, what remedies did you use and have you experienced immunity to strep throat since? Please chime in with the strep throat cures which worked for you below.
Want to connect with Martin? These links below will point you in the right direction:
(youtube) www.youtube.com/martindebourge
(bio) www.15hifi.com/site/martindebourge
More Information
Remedy for Sore Throat (fast acting)
How to Repair Your Gut After Antibiotics
Why Antibiotics Today Could Threaten Your Life Tomorrow
Best Natural Antibiotics and How to Use Them
Fever Blisters Home Remedy
Our sixteen year old came back from camp with what appeared to be strep. We have been saying NO to antibiotics for the past six years. The second night our son had the classic red throat and 101.9 fever. I found your site and began the garlic, honey and cayenne. Over night he Improved and by day three almost healed. I am a fan of natural remedies and have seen many heal. We will keep this remedy in our family for many years! Thank you!
Hooooooweeee! That garlic Cayenne pepper mix is yuuucky! But I feel like it works.. I’m pretty sure I DONT have strep throat but decided this would definitly help my bad sore throat. I woke up and my throat was on fire and ended up finding this site.. Not sure how I lean on antibiotics since I remember when I was in High school a girl died from strep because it attacked her heart I believe.. I think she had heart issues before though… Anyway I like this remedy and its helping my sore throat feel better after only a few times taking that mixture and gargling with ACV 🙂
The danger of rheumatic fever and other post streptococcal complications is that you do in fact feel better before it shows itself. 2 years ago I unknowingly had strep, “recovered” in 5-7 days but unbeknownst to me the strep began to attack my body. I was back to normal and passed it off as a cold. But about 14 days later I had erythema nodosum and arthritis appear overnight. I couldn’t walk or put shoes on for 2months. The pain was 8/10 and the swelling was awful. Hopefully no damage has been done to my heart. Only time will tell, but I don’t recommend refraining from getting treated. I was 28 when this happened so I wasn’t a kid. Prior to this I hadn’t had strep for almost 20 years…
Dana, I too developed erythema nodosum after not treating strep. I had just graduated high school and moved away from home. I didn’t have insurance and knew right away that it was strep, but didn’t have money, so I just kind of suffered through it. About 3 weeks later, I got strep again and had these ugly spots show up on my legs. I went back home this time and went to several doctors (over the course of 2 months) before someone could finally tell me what they were. Really painful, and I looked like I had taken a severe beating.
I’m an ER nurse practitioner, and I’m SUPER conservative when it comes to antibiotics. For example, around of ear “infections” and bronchitis cases are viral, and sinusitis is NOT considered bacterial (so antibiotics don’t help) unless the patient has had symptoms for 10+ days, or 5+ days WITH a fever/severe pain. So I often have to counsel patients NOT to take antibiotics. HOWEVER- it is a different story when it comes to strep throat- left untreated, patients can have heart and/or kidney complications, as well as PANDAS (neurological issue). So I ALWAYS treat positive strep swabs; we also send all negatives off for a culture to be safe. Just because the infection will clear up in 3-5 days on it’s own does NOT prevent the serious complications from occurring later….
Its been 8 days and my strep throat hasnt gone away what should I do?
Gargle with Apple cider vinager plug your nose to prevent gaging. It works evertime! Use half water mixed with it if its to strong, gargle about half a cup hold and gargle for as long as you can. Then spit. And youl see all the bacteria come out withing 2 hours youl feel good as new!
Contact your doctor immediately. Don’t use any folk treatments. Most of these folk treatments came about before people even understood how illnesses worked.
Garlic is an analgesic. Strep is an infection. It doesn’t kill bacteria in your system. Neither does gargling vinegar. Though, if you ask the right person, vinegar will cure everything.
Something we do that’s super easy is to gargle hydrogen peroxide or a mixture of HP and water. If gargling isn’t possible, such as in the case of youngsters, put a couple drops of HP in the ears, let it rest for a bit and then drain out, and do the other ear. This has always helped us avoid strep, especially when done at first sign of illness.
NEVER put anything in the ears! If anything, I’d say dip a Qtip in peroxide and then swab out the ear. I tried this once on the advice of a natural health blogger and I had pain in my ears for DAYS! I gargle with peroxide (50% / 50% mix with water) but I will NEVER again put drops of it in my ears. Even oils for ear infections should be rubbed around and in the ear, not dropped directly inside.
A mix of equal amounts peroxide, rubbing alcohol and white vinegar is a very effective means of treating an inner-ear infection or just cleaning wax. Don’t use straight peroxide, as it’s very harsh and will give you a headache.
I’m not at all one to run to the doctor at the first sign of illness. I had strep a couple times as a child, and then as an adult in 1992. I ignored the sore throat at first, thinking it would go away. I got sicker and sicker and my lymph nodes were very swollen. Finally after a week I went to the doctor and got an antibiotic, and that quickly resolved it.
Several years later it was summer when I got a sore throat. Again, I didn’t think it was strep right away and just waited to see if it would get better. After a few days I called the clinic to see if I could get tested for strep. They dismissed me, saying it wasn’t strep season and likely I just had some mild virus and I’d be better soon. I kept trying to muscle through it, even going to a family wedding that weekend during which I felt miserable, but didn’t want to stay home since I was told I couldn’t have strep. Finally over a week later my lymph nodes were again horribly swollen and I couldn’t swallow without intense pain so I went in and got tested. Yep, strep. Again, antibiotics turned it around for me.
So, clearly, trying to muscle through it the first time didn’t prevent me from getting strep again, and I didn’t get better on my own the second time either, although I significantly delayed treatment.
I hate taking any unnecessary meds and am well aware of “super” bugs and don’t want to contribute to that so I never rush out and get antibiotics, but they do have their place. My Grandpa’s brother died at age 22 because he had a heart attack due to his heart being weakened years earlier by rheumatic fever.
Amen….my dad died to the step settling in his kidneys and had to go on dialysis and died after a transplant. This article is not valid.
I probably wouldn’t have gone to that wedding if I were you. “Musclign through it” doesn’t mean carrying on as usual. I totally baby myself and lounge around in and out of bed until I’m totally better. I understand most poeple don’t have lifestyles that allow for that, but as a work from home mom, I have that “luxury” if you can call it that. When ill, I sleep whenever my toddler will allow, stay indoors for 2-3 days or so and then after that, only go out for necessities bundled up like it’s the arctic for the next 3-4 days after my 2-3 days of total rest. I also do the apple cider vinegar (to get body ph back in line and make it more efficient at fighting the infection) and I also gargle with 50/50 peroxide diluted with water before bed.
I feel the same way. I bet everyone at that wedding would have wanted Joya to stay home if polled. I hate it when people are too stubborn to stay home and end up exposing a ton of other people to contagious diseases. “Muscling through it” does not include going to social functions full of people who don’t deserve to be dining with strep patients.
I feel that antibiotics are necessary for strep infections…..maybe nothing else really “requires” antibiotics, but strep is different. I will use these remedies on my daughter to help her feel better faster, but I will also get an antibiotic from the doctor as well.
I agree..my younger sister had strep and didn’t present any signs pr symptoms until she had scarlet fever. I think people need to be educated on the effects of not being tested.
I am definitely going to try this method next time, with what I’ve been doing the last four weeks with my own bout of strep. I gargle with oregano oil and warm sales water four times a day, and took my own tincture of chaga, Echinacea, usnea, new England asteroid and elderberry. I was in incredible pain for three weeks with a dozen white spots on my inflamed red throat. After following this regimen for three weeks I had no more white spots, and a test at the walk in clinic confirmed strep wasn’t there anymore. I also drank sage tea and ate more garlic than usual. I seriously believe I had strep and got rid of it naturally.
I am big on home remedies myself but this advice is very dangerous I am a strep throat carrier and have muscle through it many times and ended up developing a horrible strand of strep throat that could have killed me if I didn’t go to the doctor so I would definitely advise putting somewhere in this blog that you should definitely seek medical advice if symptoms continue after so long. aside from being a carrier of strep I’m a very healthy person so again this advice is very dangerous
I never comment but had to this time. After a night of medium partying for new years. On Thursday night I had a dry throat and drank lots of water throughout the day on Friday. But by that evening my throat was pretty sore. I normally have a regimen including camu camu vit c, fulvic minerals and chlorella but had not taken it for 2 days. I am 45 about 105lbs. and that night I had the worst sore throat of my life. I tried everything drinking a tsp of sea salt in 1/2 cup hot water, gargled with Epsom salt and clove oil, took hylands severe coldand sore throat drink, Hall’s site throat drops and everything just made it hurt more. I put drops of clove oil thieves oil and grapefruit seed extract to my finger and ruined it onto my tonsil area and noticed there was white stuff on my finger. I didn’t know until later that white spots was a sign off step. I finally resorted to cutting slices of ginger I had in the fridge to make my own drops and bit into it to swallow the juices and finally felt some relief at about 5 am. Sat I was in the bed all day DH got me the garlic cloves and minced them for me. I had a little bit of raw honey on hand and added a tbs to the garlic and a little over 1/8 tsp of cayenne pepper and ran it through mini shake maker to puree. Took the 1st dose at 530 and about 1/8 tsp every 1/2 hr till I went to bed at 1015. After the first couple of doses I could swallow without as much pain and could talk a little bit and ate some eggs DH cooked for me. Warm stuff really hurt so ate cold butternut squash soup and drank water. Is Sunday and the massive pain is practically gone. In a witness that this stuff really works! A million thanks!
An easier and quicker solution is to drink warm sea salt water (first the regular way straight down your throat and then also bending your head forward when you swallow to make sure it gets everywhere). The reason gargling might not always work is because it doesn’t get down far enough. I have been doing this for years with my family. Each time we start getting a sore throat we drink warm sea salt water and it kills the germs on contact.
The reason drinking it works isn’t necessarily that it “gets everywhere”. Salt water, expecially taken first thing in the morning, gets the body’s ph back into an alkali state to more efficiently fight infections.
My mother had always told me to do this with simple sore throats and boy did I hate it because it tasted so nasty, But I woke up today and had the worst pain in my throat I’d ever had, When I tried the salt water I felt a WHOLE lot better
It’s not gone completely but if I keep trying this I think it will work in a day or so