Nasal sprays for Covid prevention and treatment

A deep dive on Enovid, Betadine Cold Defense, Xlear, Epothex, Cofixrx, Azelastine, and the rest.

I’ve been getting a lot of questions from people in the know about nasal sprays for Covid prevention and treatment. Since the start of the pandemic there has been chatter, but recently there is a buzz. The New York Times published an article about this topic last week. It was a good review, but with insufficient details.

Perhaps we are looking for other options because new variants are so incredibly contagious. Our once-effective vaccines and boosters only work so well for a couple months now against infection (but are still durable against severe disease). The Covid incubation period is so short that it’s unlikely any vaccine will ever eradicate SARS CoV-2. And prior infections only give us a few months of decent protection against reinfection, too. Wearing a mask or respirator increasingly makes us social pariahs thanks to politics and reestablished human social norms. So why not spray something up our noses if it might help? No one will even suspect we’ve done so!

But does t…