Two years ago I posted a story I learned in my Microbiology class about a man (a real person) that always had an infection in his left ear, but not in his right ear. Doctors kept giving him
Antibiotics and medication but nothing worked. One day, he magically cured his left ear by putting some ear wax from his right ear into his left ear. How did this cure his left ear? Because his right ear had good bacteria that cured the left ear.
I had a good theory a long time ago but I forgot about it since I didn't have a way of testing it, but I suddenly remembered it today and I really think it could work.
My theory is that most people have EC because they don't have any good bacteria on their lips. I don't know how we lost all the good bacteria from our lips, either from
Antibiotics ,
Antibiotic creams, washing/peeling lips, or something else. The only way to cure it is to get good bacteria onto our lips again.
Healthy people without EC have lots of good bacteria on their lips so they have no lip problems. When it's cold and/or dry, some of that bacteria dies (because they need warmth and moisture to grow) and lips become chapped. Moisturizing cures chapped lips because it gives the bacteria moisture to grow and multiply.
People with EC do not have any good bacteria on their lips- That's why moisturizing their lips doesn't do anything. There is no good bacteria to even grow so moisturizing is useless.
I can only think of two ways of getting good bacteria onto our lips right now.
1. Kissing someone without EC (which most of us probably won't want to do)
2. Telling someone without EC to swab their lips and then swabbing it onto our lips.
It might take a while in order to get enough good bacteria back onto our lips, and after we have enough, then moisturizing would work. Let me know if you have anymore method ideas.
Note: Putting probiotics on your lips doesn't work because it's intestinal bacteria and not lip bacteria.
Before White Shark comes in here and says it's intestinal bacteria-related and not lip bacteria-related, I still stand by my theory that it is lip-bacteria related. When people get chapped lips and heal their lips with moisture, nothing is changing in their intestines. There is a change in lip bacteria. I tried treating my intestines with no results for 2 years, but now I really think it is lip bacteria related.
It explains everything. It explains why people don't have EC (because they have good lip bacteria), why moisturizers treat chapped lips (because it allows the good bacteria on lips to grow), and why moisturizers do not help people with EC (because they don't have good bacteria on their lips).
Of course, not everyone has EC for the same reason though.
Does anyone want to test my theory or have any thoughts about it? I really think it could work.. Like the guy with the infected ear, doctors don't know that good bacteria can help.