Summer first aid: natural ways to tell bugs to bug off, flies to be gone and bees to flit away - The Herbalist

Vegetarian Times, June, 1997 by Sally Eauclaire Osborne

If you get a sunburn, the gel of the aloe vera plant cools the bum and helps it heal. Cut a fresh leaf lengthwise and squeeze the gel directly on the skin. Bottled aloe juice also works well, provided it is a potent whole product and not mostly water. You can also apply mini-compresses from black tea bags; the healer is tannic acid which cools sun-in-flamed tissues. For a ready-made product consider calendula (marigold) cream or St. John's wort oil.

Campfire and kitchen stove burns are treated similarly. Immersing the burned area in cool water normally comes first unless a remedy is right at hand. "Aloe is very soothing," says Claudia Wingo, R.N., who treated many burns as a nurse in Australia and is now an herbalist in Silver Springs, Md. Other soothers are black tea and apple cider vinegar (don't worry - the vinegar doesn't sting). Tea tree oil also works and will sterilize the wound upon contact. If the wound is not forming a red scab, apply raw (unheated, unpasteurized) honey. "I used that a lot in Australia," she says. Despite what good old Uncle Harry might have told you, don't use butter or vegetable oils on burns. They keep the heat in, make the pain worse and retard healing.

Tales abound of the remarkable burn-healing power of pure lavender oil. Indeed the term "aromatherapy" was coined by the French cosmetic chemist Rene Maurice Gattefosse, who, in 1920, sustained a severe burn on his hand and forearm. In the panic of the moment, he dipped his arm into a vat of lavender oil thinking it was water. To his shock and amazement, the burning stopped and the burn healed completely in a day or two without a trace of a scar. Few of us usually have a vat of lavender oil handy but the essential oil can be dripped directly on the burn. Use it liberally for best results.

HEALING BODY DENTS AND DINGS

For cuts and scrapes, the most popular remedy worldwide is Australia's tea tree oil, known by those in the know as Melaleuca. Widely used as a disinfectant during World War II, it's now one of the most widely available germicidals for use on cuts, not to mention warts, athlete's foot, jock itch and other skin infections.

"I wouldn't use tea tree oil [a bactericide] on a wound unless it was likely to be infected," cautions Wingo. "Calendula [pot marigold or Calendula officinalis] is my choice for a nice clean wound. For a dirty wound, I would not use calendula, I would use tea tree oil. Calendula might stimulate fast healing at the skin's surface, locking in the infection below the the surface."

As scabbing occurs, CJ Puotinen, author of Nature's Antiseptics: Tea Tree Oil and Grapefruit Seed Extract (Keats, 1997), recommends adding vitamin E, squeezed out of a capsule, to the tea tree oil. According to Puotinen, the combination speeds healing and helps prevent scarring.

Treat sore muscles, swellings or bruises differently from cuts and abrasions that break the skin. Sometimes the result of a summer sports injury to a hibernator getting up and at 'em after the winter doldrums, these injuries are the fruit of doing too much too soon. Homeopathic Arnica montana pellets taken internally plus arnica cream applied externally are most commonly recommended by homeopaths.