A Spoonful of Honey Helps to Cure a Child's Nasty Cough

By Gwenn Garland, Daily Times (USA), 2/19/2009

My mom used to give me a cup of peppermint tea with a big spoonful of honey when I was sick, and it was always soothing. That spoonful was probably what did the trick. WebMD calls honey "the world's best children's cough medicine." Several studies have found that a spoonful of honey is actually more useful in calming kids' coughs than over-the-counter cough medicine. It beat the pants off dextromethorphan, so no longer let the pharmacy aisle tempt you when it comes to helping out a child with a cough. That's great, since no one is supposed to use that medicine on children under age 6 anyway. Just break out the cute little bear bottle and give them one to two teaspoons full. Its effects also work on adults, so give yourself a spoonful if you have a cough, too. But babies under 12 months can't have honey -- they're too susceptible to botulism that might be present in it. So those little peeps are out of luck (maybe corn or maple syrup would have a similar effect?)…