Easy method for resolving pinkeye by harnessing the power of probiotics. No meds needed!
Pinkeye, also called conjunctivitis or madras eye, is an extremely contagious bacterial or viral infection. The illness involves the outermost layer of the eye and the inside surface of the eyelid.
It is a common seasonal condition when pollen counts are high, allergies are running rampant, and immunity for most people is very low from moderate to severe vitamin D deficiency. This problem is compounded from being inside all winter out of the vitamin D producing rays of the sun.
Symptoms of Pinkeye
Symptoms of pinkeye include redness, itching, tearing, swelling, and/or mucous production that can firmly cement the eyelids together while sleeping. I remember getting pinkeye as a child and feeling a bit of panic upon waking in the morning and being unable to open one or both eyes!
If this happens to you or a loved one in your home, a warm, wet washcloth compress gently applied to the infected eye (do not rub) quickly dissolves the mucous allowing the eyes to open.
Conjunctivitis is Extremely Contagious
Pinkeye can spread rapidly through a household, which is why action is needed immediately to stop the infection. Most people will quickly run to the doctor’s office at the first sign of redness and irritation.
A prescription for antibiotic eye drops or ointment is the usual conventional remedy. Relief is mercifully quick once the drops are applied. Before the wonderful sensation of relief can be experienced, however, the inconvenience of booking a doctor’s appointment, waiting to be examined, driving to the pharmacy, and getting the prescription filled must be endured.
Additional hassles involve missing work and/or school for the parent and child. Add to this the expense of the visit and filling the prescription which combined could easily total $50 or even more.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful to just fix this simple infection at home with none of the intervening steps?
Simple Home Remedy
You’ll be happy to know that pinkeye is one of the simplest and easiest infections to cure at home with no trip to the doctor required. Even better, what you need to fix the problem may already be sitting in your refrigerator. The remedy I’m speaking of harnesses the power of beneficial bacteria to eliminate the infection.
While doctors prescribe ANTI-biotics to kill the pathogens, PRO-biotics work just as well for a minor infection such as pinkeye by crowding them out.
Harness the Power of Probiotics
What you need to remedy pinkeye is a probiotic-rich, non-acidic liquid. For babies and children, the most effective liquid that fits this description is human breastmilk.Â
If the Mom in your household happens to be breastfeeding, a drop or two of breastmilk expressed into a cup and then applied with a clean eyedropper to the infected eye will rapidly and magically eliminate the infection. First milk or colostrum works even faster (note that colostrum supplements do not work).
Reapplication may be necessary every hour for a few hours, but in almost every case, the infection will be gone well before you could have even gotten an appointment to see the doctor. This remedy works well for newborn babies also, so no need for the eyedrops that are used immediately after birth if you plan to breastfeed.
Probiotic Options
If there is no one breastfeeding in your home, the next best thing would be a few drops of raw cow or goat milk applied to each eye.
I recommend treating both eyes even if only one is showing signs of infection, by the way.
Pinkeye is so contagious, that treating only the infected eye will usually result in having to treat the other eye within a short time anyway, so might as well do both from the beginning.
Raw cow or goat milk is loaded with immunity-boosting probiotics, just like human breastmilk. These beneficial bacteria work immediately on contact to crowd out and eliminate the pathogens at the source of the infection.
The probiotic strains in fresh, unprocessed dairy are especially suited for clearing a pinkeye infection.
Reapplication every hour or so should eliminate the infection quickly, perhaps not quite as fast as breastmilk, but still faster by a long shot than getting to the doctor and filling a prescription.
Note that pasteurized or organic store milk also does not work because they contain no probiotics.
Other Sources of Beneficial Microbes
No fresh from the cow dairy easily available where you live?
You can also mix the contents of a probiotic capsule in a few ounces of water and drip a few drops into the eye.
I recommend this baby probiotic brand as it the strain found in breastmilk and has no other additives.
This has been known to work as well.
Frequent Pinkeye May Indicate Nutritional Deficiency
Are you or any members of your family suffering from pinkeye symptoms on a frequent basis? If so, consider adding a cod liver oil supplement to your daily regimen.
This is the brand my family has used since 2015.
Deficiency in vitamin A, one of the most critical vitamins for optimal eye health, can result in frequent pinkeye infections. Incidentally, it also contributes to other illnesses such as croup and night blindness.Â
Unprocessed cod liver oil that is tested free of impurities is the best source of natural Vitamin A.
If the cod liver oil is processed (most brands are), then the Vitamin A is most likely synthetic.
This is because it has been destroyed by heat or chemical processing. Synthetic vitamin A does not have the same benefits for the eyes.
Multivitamins have the same problem. They contain only synthetic vitamin A or beta carotene. Note that beta carotene is not true vitamin A.
It is a precursor that the body must convert to true vitamin A. Many people simply do not make this conversion very well especially if they have any sort of digestive problems.
How Long Until Improvement?
The pinkeye home remedy described in this article should resolve the infection rapidly.
Usually, symptoms improve within hours. After a few applications, the eye should be fine within 24 hours.
If not, the infection may be viral in nature or related to some other underlying condition. Seeing a doctor is recommended at that point.
Works for Pets Too!
Keep in mind that this pinkeye home remedy doesn’t just work for children and adults.
Believe it or not, this home remedy is also safe to use on pets who have any sort of eye-related bacterial issues.
I’ve personally used it on guinea pigs and cats over the years with great success.
Thank you Laura.
Hi! My husband is almost always the one to pick up and has gone to different locations in Houston and Katy. I don’t know all the locations but the name of the farm is Stryk Jersey Farm. Their website is texascheese.com. You can contact them and get the locations and times. They go a couple places every Saturday morning. If you pick up on the farm in Schulenberg it’s only $5/gallon. They’re usually good about answering emails.
Hello Laura N.
Can you tell me the address of the parking lot where you pick up raw milk and their schedule every weekend. I can get raw milk at my place but not familiar with TX. I come to TX every summer to visit my family and my kids stay there the whole summer and i do not know where to buy the raw milk in TX, usually they do not have milk to drink in the summer there, thanks a lot.
My response is directed at “Kat”, the self-stated emergency medicine physician.
Kat, your advice (not to put a non-ophthalmic substance in the eye), was sound, you were very disrespectful to the optometry profession. An optometrist is not merely a “trained professional who fit you for glasses.” You are thinking of an optician, someone who does not have any power to diagnose or treat disease, is not nationally recognized as a physician, and did not attend 4 years of school to earn the degree “Doctor of Optometry”. To boil down an entire profession to a simple refractionist is a gross misunderstanding of the field.
And optometrist is a primary care doctor for your eyes, while an ophthalmologist is a specialist. An optometrist is taught how to diagnose and treat a vast number of diseases. It is mainly when a patient needs more extensive treatment or invasive surgery that would require an ophthalmologist.
Both fields are very important for ocular health. There is a reason that opticians do not have the right to refract patients; it is because they cannot screen for disease. Again, do not boil down an entire field without knowing what you are talking about.
Some states can’t sell it. CA may be the only one that sells it in stores (not sure). In TX we get it from a farm that comes to town every weekend for delivery. We pick up in a parking lot ($7/gallon!). I didn’t check but I think if you go to the realmilk website you can find “real” milk in your state.
Where is everybody getting this RAW MILK from?? Ive been to every organic grocery store in town. Trader Joes, Central Market, Whole Foods. Unless you people have a cow in your backyard, can you please shine some light on WHERE RAW MILK IS LOCATED AND CAN BE PURCHASED IMMEDIATELY…
Please and Thank you
I just happened to find this article. My grandson appears to have pink eye. Will frozen breast milk work or does freezing kill the live cultures?
HOW TO USE ROSEMARY FOR PINK EYE AND OTHER EYE IRRITATIONS.
Rosemary is a natural antiseptic. It’s great for eye washes and skin irritations too.
Place1 teaspoon of dried Rosemary herb into a coffee mug of water. (I use regular rosemary which is sold in grocery stores as a kitchen spice for cooking, such as McCormick and I use water from my faucet).
Place the mug in your microwave and allow it to get hot and then boil for about 20-30 seconds. Take out, set mug on counter, let cool to a comfortable warm temperature.
Now, rip a paper towel in half and dip half of it into the Rosemary “tea” and saturate it. Pull off all loose pieces of rosemary clinging to the paper towel. Wash your eye with the wet paper towel, saturating the eye. Discard used paper towel.
Now take the other dry half of that paper towel you had torn in half and use it to wash out your other eye, if your other eye is infected too. Again, discard used towel.
Cover coffee mug, place it in your refrigerator and use solution later at noontime, in the mid-afternoon, in the early evening and just before you go to bed too. (Just warm it up to make the solution more comfortable to use).
The tea will become browner as the day goes on, which just means that more of the antiseptic oil has leeched out from the Rosemary pieces into the water, making your solution even stronger. By the end of the day if it makes your own eye water a little, just dilute the solution a little with some fresh water. This is not an exact science and you can’t do it wrong. If the solution feels comfortable to your own eyes, it will feel the same to your pet’s eyes too.
Make a new cup of Rosemary “tea” in the morning. Do this for about 5 days and you…and your pets….should be fine.
This works great on my dog’s eyes, cat’s eyes and my own eyes.
Thank you so much for this post. I wasn’t able to use breastmilk or kefir but I did try kombucha tea, which also has probiotics. I noticed an immediate improvement of my pink eye within 15 – 20 minutes.
When I had pink eye, the pharmacist told me to use J&J baby shampoo to relieve the pain. But it has to be J&J because there is an analgesic. Just close you eye and rub on, works great.