Head Lice Treatment

I was just sorting through some of Luke's school papers and came across an information sheet about head lice. Anyone reading this who has children has undoubtedly had to at least think about these nasty little critters, since they seem to go hand-in-hand with the beginning of every school year.

What caused me to pause as I read the literature, however, is the fact that the only treatment plan to get rid of head lice that is recommended by our school district is a product called NIX. Luckily, Pete and I have not had to deal with head lice in our family yet, but I can assure you that if/when we do, I will not be dousing my children's heads with NIX!

The NIX website describes the product as containing "permethrin." A quick online search lead me to Wikipedia, which described permethrin as follows:

Permethrin is a common synthetic chemical, widely used as an insecticide, an acaricide and as an insect repellent. It belongs to the family of synthetic chemicals called pyrethroids and functions as a neurotoxin. Its use is controversial since, as a broad-spectrum chemical, it kills indiscriminately; as well as the intended pests, it can harm beneficial insects including honey bees, aquatic life, and small mammals such as mice.

And herein lies the problem with pesticides....they are designed to kill living, celled beings. They don't discriminate between the cells of a lice nit and the cells in your child's body. There have to be other options, I thought! Head lice has been around for years....what did parents do before the development of synthetic pesticides?

It took me another 10 seconds to research "natural treatment for head lice" and I came up with a number of options, the most compelling of which is to completely coat your child's hair with olive oil and let it stand for 30 minutes. The logic being that "The oil covers the lice and eggs, preventing them from breathing. Unlike pesticides, suffocation does not seem to be something lice can build up immunity against!" Granted, this particular treatment method requires multiple applications and so might not work quite as quickly as a product such as NIX, but in my opinion, getting rid of head lice quickly is not worth the risk of applying a known neurotoxin to my child's body.

Like I said, we have never had to actually deal with the problem of head lice in our home (and hopefully we never will!) and so maybe I am truly naive as to how horrible the problem of head lice can be, but from where I stand today and from all that I have read these past 9 months about pesticides, I would be extremely hard pressed to use NIX or any similar product on my child's body just for the sake of getting rid of head lice faster.

Definitely let me know if you have have tried other natural treatment options that have been successful so that I can pass the word along to fellow parents! And if you want more information about the olive oil option, click here.

Lastly, I know that there are a handful of teachers and administrators from Luke's school who are faithful readers of my blog...Please let me know how I can help to gather and disseminate information out to parents about ways to get rid of head lice in a more natural way! I want to help!