Lysine and Cold Sores – A Quick Natural Remedy

Lysine, an essential amino acid obtained from your diet is an excellent cold sore treatment, but only if used correctly.

It has been proven an effective cold sore treatment for in studies if ingested in proper quantities. It has little, if any, effect if applied topically.

Why is this so? To understand this, we need to take a look at what creates cold sores and see how lysine works.

The herpes simplex virus is usually dormant and benign, lying in wait in the facial nerves. When it activates, it travels up through the nerves to the facial surface and causes millions of surface cells to erupt and produce a new active virus.

It is this destruction of surface cells that you see as a cold sore, fever blister, or oral herpes.

Arginine, a common amino acid found in many foods, is a protein that must be present in order for a cell to create a new herpes virus.

Cells store lysine in the same storage area as arginine so the more lysine in storage, the less room for arginine. And, lysine cannot be used to create herpes virus. Lysine is anti-virus in this respect.

Flooding your cells with will crowd out much of the arginine. These cells will not then be able to act as virus factories. The herpes will return to dormancy when it encounters this situation.

Not only does this quickly stop the progression of a cold sore, it can also prevent cold sores, fever blisters and oral herpes events from starting.

The key then is the lysine to arginine balance. You need to get more lysine than arginine into your diet.

One way to do this would be to decrease your arginine intake by eliminating chocolate and nuts. At the same time, increase your lysine intake by eating fish (especially flounder), cheese, yogurt and vegetables.

This type of a restrictive diet will work, but it is a slow to show results. It is also often inconvenient or impractical. Because of this, many people depend on supplements to achieve success when using lysine for cold sores.

The good news is that lysine supplements are quite inexpensive and are  available almost anywhere. The best choice would be 500-milligram capsules. The capsules disperse faster in the stomach.

A usual regimen calls for people to take two to four grams per day (2000 to 4000 milligrams) during a cold sore outbreak.

Lysine is a simple, common protein and is quite safe. For example, eating a pound of flounder would give you about 14,000 milligrams (14 grams) of lysine.

Continued supplementation with lysine is not recommended. Taking 500 to 1000 milligrams per day as a maintenance dosage to help prevent cold sores tends to get your body to it and you will have to take higher and higher dosages as time goes on.

While lysine will work very well for you if taken orally, if you put it directly on the sore it has very little value.

The reason I mention this is because there are cold sore remedies at the store and on-line that are topical treatments containing lysine. They may have other ingredients that help, but the lysine will add nothing to the results.

Lysine must get into the cells to fight and prevent cold sores. It does not absorb through the skin, but must come from your bloodstream.

Lysine for cold sores is one of the better cold sore remedies for you. You may find that it can be many times more powerful when used with my other well-respected cold sore remedies.

Whether your cold sores, fever blisters or oral herpes sores seem to drag on forever, or you are getting a lot of outbreaks, lysine for cold sores could be your biggest step toward lifetime freedom from the hideous cold sore.