Block That Cold!

A new zinc nasal spray may curtail your sniffles, but hand washing is still your best defense

Are you one of those lucky devils who never catch a cold or can easily slough it off? Not me. Two days after my throat starts itching--the classic first sign of an upper-respiratory infection--I'm too congested to think straight. All I want to do for the next five days is sink into a warm bed or drown in a vat of chicken soup. So I was intrigued early last week by reports of a nasal spray, called Zicam, that is supposed to keep a cold from lasting more than a day and a half. Even though the results sounded too good...

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