[Emoticon4032]

A couple of decades ago, I was on a commercial aircraft and sat next to a man who occasionally puffed something into his nostrils. It turned out that he was a researcher at Ft. Detrick, and he explained that keeping your nasal passages moist with saline spray helped to keep out germs. I’ve been using saline sprays ever since!

[Modified3019]

An interesting thing to consider, is that face masks act as humidifiers for nasal passages.

When I first started doing cardio, my nose would dry out (mouth breathing should be avoided) to the point of being painful so I’d put on an N95 mask to retain humidity. Was a great help, though I no longer need it though.

I use an evaporative wick humidifier in my room (a Vornado Evap40). And it’s made a big quality of life improvement as well. Keeps me from waking up at night with painfully dry nasal passages.

Some tips:

* Never use ultrasonic humidifiers, those aerosolize the bacteria that inevitably grows in water, along with the minerals which can coat surfaces.

* I also recommend getting the largest capacity tanks you can find for less refilling, and looking for a fan that’s large and quiet.

* Keep humidity below 60%. (I set my cutoff to about 57%). Above this things start to feel damp, and mold growth start to become possible, especially in localized areas.

* The wick type humidifiers do have wicks as a maintenance item, I generally replace the every 1.5-2 months about, sanitizing the whole unit at the same time. Curiously, if you let them dry out, even if still pretty new, they’ll smell bad.

* The glug sounds from the water releasing from the tanks can be disturbing for a bit if you are sensitive to sounds. You do get used to it eventually. I also have a big air filter always running that provides nice white noise that that helps buffer the sudden glug noise. The only alternative really is to rig a waterline and something that can meter water into the humidifier basin without risk of failing to stop and flooding your room.

[tshaddox]

That’s one of the leading explanations for why flu outbreaks are seasonal. Years ago I was rather surprised to realize that we kinda just don’t know.

[AStonesThrow]

That, I am afraid, sounds like utter BS. Consider the mechanical action at play here. (If you will delve into gross sticky nose stuff.)

First, nasal mucus is thicker, more viscous than saline spray. It's produced in normal quantities by healthy people, but that production increases when infections or allergies happen, naturally.

By diluting mucus, and making it runny and watery, you're going to defeat its purpose, which is to trap various debris as you inhale, and stop it penetrating further into the nose and body.

So now your mucus defenses are down, yet you've got a little puffer in hand, constantly forcing saline upwards into the nose, more powerfully than simple inhalations. That very upwards and inwards motion is going to force stuff into your body that didn't want to go there, including germs!

It's absolutely counterproductive and sounds like quackery.

Now, if you already detected irritation or allergies based on foreign objects or germs, for example by discolored or thickened mucus, or more than usual, and then you proceed to carefully flush your passages with saline, Neti pot style, allowing it to drain away and out of the nose and sinuses, that would be somewhat effect, but you'd need to be careflu that you're not forcing it inwards. I mean, that is exactly what a runny nose is for during a cold. Don't thwart a runny nose, just clean it away regularly and work with those natural defenses! UGH! (For that matter, don't aggressively attack mild fevers, because fevers are part of an immune response, not the lethal brain-cooking threat we all fear.)

I wonder if this military researcher was consciously aware that he was spreading misinformation to ordinary civilians... hmm

[orbisvicis]

Airplanes bleed external air from the engines into the cabin, which leads to an extremely dry environment. Possibly dry enough to harden and crack mucus. Or perhaps in dry environments the body just decides not to waste water on mucus generation. I have no idea.

[AlbertCory]

This sounds science-y.

In fact, I use NeilMed, a commercial saline & bicarb powder together with distilled water, and I know from past exchanges on HN that lots of others here do, too. My own doctor said it was fine and lots of her patients do it. The solution runs out the other nostril, which is gross so you do it in private.

I have very few colds, allergies, or sinus infections since starting it, although it doesn't eliminate them all.

This Fort Detrick guy, though... that might be misinformation. I use the spray once a day, twice if I have a cold. Definitely not constantly.