Is There a Home Remedy for Getting Rid of the Common Cold?

Ginger Tea

Put about five slices of ginger root into water (about 300ml) and cook about 10 minutes. Drink a cup of the boiled water (about 250ml) with or without brown sugar. The patient may sweat slightly and recover.

Ginger, hot in nature and pungent in taste, induces sweat, clears external pathogens, warms the lung and stops coughs. Therefore, it is effective for some common cold.

Ginger tea is effective for common cold when it is caused by wind-cold; while, the condition caused by wind-heat worsens if the patient drinks ginger tea.

Symptoms and signs of wind-cold and wind-heat:

When the cause is wind-cold, the manifestations include significant aversion to cold, slight fever, no sweat, headache and body aches, clear nasal discharge, coughs with clear white sputum, no thirst or thirst with desire for hot drinks, white and thin tongue coating.

When the cause is wind-heat, the manifestations include high fever, slight aversion to wind, distending pain in the head, sweating, red and swelling throat with pain, coughs with sticky/yellow sputum, stuffy nose with yellow discharge, thirst with desire to drink water, red tongue tip and sides, thin and white (slightly yellow) tongue coating .