7 home remedies to try for a sore throat

By Kathleen Felton

For The Washington Post

Woke up to a sore, scratchy throat? You may want to blame it on dry air, but it’s usually a sign your body is fighting a viral infection.

“The top five causes of a sore throat are a virus, a virus, a virus, a virus and a virus,” said Elisabeth Fowlie Mock, a family physician and director at the American Academy of Family Physicians. The culprits that can trigger a sore throat include rhinoviruses (the most common cause of colds), influenza, coronavirus and respiratory syncytial virus.

Throat pain is often your first symptom because viruses first latch on in this area of your body, said Benjamin C. Tweel, an assistant professor of otolaryngology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

“The virus is getting into the cells lining the throat, and it’s probably causing an inflammatory response in your body’s immune system,” said Tweel, also the medical director for the department of otolaryngology at Mount Sinai Health System. When the body recognizes a viral intruder, lymphatic tissue in the back of the nose and throat swells and becomes inflamed, causing pain, the experts said.

“Every so often, your body fights it off, and you don’t get the full-blown thing,” Mock said. Other times, the classic symptoms of an upper respiratory infection follow, including a runny nose, congestion and cough.

Throat pain from an upper respiratory infection usually gets better within one week, acco...