Hot colds should not be treated with ginger soup
Every time I catch a cold, the elderly in my family always tell me to drink brown sugar ginger soup. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't. I'd like to ask, why doesn't drinking brown sugar ginger soup work for colds sometimes?
Answer: Drinking a bowl of ginger and brown sugar soup when you have a cold is a common folk remedy, but it should be noted that it is not suitable for wind-heat colds.
Traditional Chinese Medicine classifies colds into three types: wind-cold, wind-heat, and summer-heat dampness colds. They are generally exogenous diseases caused by the invasion of pathogenic wind into the human body, with main symptoms such as aversion to cold, fever, headache, nasal congestion, and cough. In addition to medical treatment based on syndrome differentiation and cause, diet should also be considered.
When treating a wind-cold cold, you can drink ginger and brown sugar water. Ginger and green onions are pungent and warm foods that can induce sweating, relieve the exterior, and regulate the lungs. The treatment effect is quite good, and the condition often improves without medication.
However, for treating a wind-heat cold, foods like ginger, green onions, and brown sugar should not be used, as they will exacerbate the heat and cause the condition to worsen. Summer-heat dampness colds are also not suitable for foods like brown sugar and ginger. Instead, cool and exterior-releasing drinks like mint tea should be given as an adjunctive treatment.