Causes Of Cold Sores That Are Easy To Avoid

What are the causes of cold sores? This article will tell you quickly. You will learn the main reasons for a cold sore. You will quickly identify the causes of cold sores for yourself.

There are many causes of cold sores that you hear about. Stress, illness, injury and winter weather are a few. They are not the actual causes of cold sores however.

They are cold sore triggers. People believe these are causes of cold sores because you will generally get an outbreak soon after you experience one of these triggers.

What they actually do is change your body in such a way as to encourage the activation of the cold sore virus.

The herpes simplex virus (type one or type two) is responsible for every cold sore, fever blister or oral herpes outbreak. It hides dormant in the roots of your nerves.

Under the right conditions, the herpes virus becomes active, moving to the surface. There it enters the nerve cells - destroying them as it creates new virus.

The herpes simplex virus can tell when there is any change in your body because it makes its home in your nerves. It will quickly sense the effects of the above mentioned triggers.

Here are the top three causes of cold sores. These conditions of your body will encourage cold sore virus activity.

1. LOW pH.

Your body's pH has a lot to do with your health. The pH scale is a measure of how acid or alkaline you are. On a scale of 1 to 14, below 7 is acid and above 7 is alkaline. For best health you should be slightly alkaline.

You usually will not get any cold sore as long as you stay above 7 pH. If your pH drops below 7 you are becoming acid. Oxygen in your cells drop and you are inviting a cold sore outbreak. This is one of the main causes of cold sores.

Stress lowers your pH levels toward the acid side. This is why they say stress causes cold sores. Fevers, cold weather and sun exposure also can cause your body to become acid - and are also considered causes of cold sores.

Coffee, soda and alcohol lower pH and causes cold sores in many people. Meats like pork and beef will do so also. Most vegetables are alkaline when digested. You must keep your diet in balance to prevent a cold sore event.

Of all the causes of cold sores, an acid pH is top of the list. The next two are also key players in creating a cold sore.

2. LYSINE AND ARGININE OUT OF BALANCE.

Arginine is a protein and the main ingredient used for creation of the herpes simplex virus. If no arginine is available, the herpes replication process cannot occur and no cold sore will happen.

Your nerve cells store arginine in a specific area. Lysine shares this storage area. Flooding your cells with lysine forces the cell to push arginine out to make room for the extra lysine.

Lysine is a protein that will not cause cold sores. The more lysine stored in your cells, the less arginine will be available. This prevents oral herpes cold sore outbreaks.

Most people who use lysine for preventing and healing cold sore eruptions use handy lysine supplements. They are cheap, easy to find and safe.

3. THE POWER OF MULTI-VITAMINS.

The strength of your immune system, and the anti-body soldiers, is dependent on several factors. The most important of which is proper quantities of vitamins and minerals.

A drop in immune strength makes weak antibodies and causes cold sores. Your best bet for treating and preventing cold sore events is to take in vitamins and minerals from quality food and supplements daily.

There are only about half the nutrients in today's food as there was in 1950. For optimum health, be sure to take a high quality multivitamin daily along with a good balanced diet.

Calcium is very high importance in cold sore avoidance. It is the main mineral used by your body to keep your body alkaline. Cold sore victims should take large doses of calcium.

As you have discovered in this article, the main causes of cold sores are an acid pH, high levels of arginine in your cells and a weak immune system.

Stress, mental or physical, causes your body to go into an acid state. Stress also uses up a lot of vitamins and minerals, which weakens your immune system.

Keep in mind that all cold sore triggers ultimately lead to these primary causes of cold sores. Eliminate these and you will not get cold sore outbreaks.