Docosanol - the active ingredient in Abreva, is fucking snake oil. I got a cold sore about a week ago and thought it was just a zit and tried to pop it. That didn’t work out, and it got infected. So I went to the pharmacy and got some docosanol cream to put on it. It says it’s an antiviral, and can reduce the healing time of a cold sore to 2.5 days!

Except it did nothing. Absolutely fucking nothing. My cold sore continued to get inflamed, angry, and painful the longer I applied docosanol cream to it. It got so bad that it started to turn black and I finally gave up on the cream and scrubbed it with hand sanitizer - I had dead skin sloughing off and it didn’t even hurt. I didn’t feel anything from the hand sanitizer because the SKIN WAS DEAD.

I’m a few days later, and finally the inflammation is down. Scrubbing it with hand sanitizer and applying triple antibiotic ointment is doing more than the docosanol ever did.

I went online and did some more research, and I don’t understand how Abreva/Docosanol is marketed as a antiviral.

An antibiotic kills bacteria. An antifungal kills fungus. An Antacid neutralizes stomach acid. AN ANTIVIRAL SHOULD KILL VIRUSES

Except Docosanol doesn’t. It doesn’t kill virus at all. It “blocks” the virus. Whatever that means. In my case - it didn’t do a damn thing. My cold sore got inflamed, infected, and had dead skin peeling off my face because it didn’t do a damn thing and this shit comes in tiny 0.07 ounce teensie tiny packets that cost over 100 dollars an ounce, when you could buy a extra large tube of triple antibiotic ointment with multiple ounces of product for 5 bucks and it actually fucking works.

I don’t understand why Abreva hasn’t been sued into oblivion. This shit is literal snake oil. It’s being marketed to do something and it does fucking nothing.

If anyone out there is lawsuit happy, I could totally see someone suing the pants off Abreva and being able to win their case in court. Myself I’m not wealthy enough to afford a lawyer, and I don’t care to go to court.

I just can’t believe this bullshit.