EDITORIAL: Confusion About Coughing

By The Blade, Toledo, Ohio

Jan. 18–AT A time when people dread catching colds and influenza, some of the new medical guidelines for treating coughing – which helps spread those winter time plagues – are less than helpful and call into question the value of cough and cold medicines.

The American College of Chest Physicians issued the recommendations to help doctors treat cough. Coughing is a leading reason why people go to the doctor, and can be a symptom of serious disease. Doctors must have science-based methods for dealing with coughs.

ACCP, however, should have considered broader, public health implications of some recommendations, which are getting wide media attention. That oversight could well contribute to the spread of respiratory diseases, including the much-feared bird flu.

The chest doctors, for instance, advised against using cough and cold remedies to treat coughs in children. In many instances, they suggested, parents should just let kids cough it out.

Most children lack the awareness to cover their coughs – as do too many adults. For children with colds or flu, those coughs fill the air with an aerosol spray of viruses that can infect other people.

What about the adults, and other children, who may become seriously ill because of ACCP’s let-them-cough stance?

ACCP also trashed the popular new generation of non-prescription cough medicines. These are non-sedating drugs, which people can take during the daytime without nodding off to dreamland.

The organization cited a lack of scientific evidence that the products work, and suggested that people return to an older generation of proven-effective remedies. Those traditional products contain a decongestant, pseudoephedrine, and an antihistamine, brompheniramine.

Brompheniramine, however, is notorious for causing sleepiness. Many people who must be alert during the day would rather cough than take it. That’s why non-sedating cough remedies have been such a success.

Although good for the individual, that advice may have unfortunate effects on society, with adults coughing more and infecting others with colds or flu.

The public health message, overlooked in popular accounts of the ACCP guidelines, is simple:

Remember that coughs spread disease. If you do let a child cough it out, keep the coughing at home. And cover your own coughs.

—–

Copyright (c) 2006, The Blade, Toledo, Ohio

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.