If you want to know how parents feel about lice in their households, take a look at this collection of Twitter posts collected by Huffington Post parenting editor Caroline Bologna. Called “47 Tweets From Parents That Sum Up The Nightmare Of Lice Outbreaks,” the article features copies of tweets that range from the horrifying to the hilarious—sometimes both at once.
Here’s a good one. “One daughter has lice. While my kids slept, I filled 15 garbage bags with stuffed animals and hid them in the attic.”
And then there is this. “Parenting tip: If your kid ever gets lice, make sure you send them to the local orphanage with the best YELP reviews.”
Here’s another favorite. “School sent a note home with my 5yo that someone had lice in his class. In unrelated news, I broke out in hives & burned all our belongings.”
Let’s try one more. “Four out of five moms agree that lice will give you a nervous breakdown. And even the fifth mom is just pretending to hold it together.”
Basically, all 47 tweets express surprise, outrage, frustration, and stress. It’s a shame because lice just aren’t that hard to beat anymore. You can see from the peoples’ reactions that myths about head lice prevail.
For example, you really don’t need to fill garbage bags with stuffed animals and keep them in the garage or attic for weeks. Lice can’t live on stuffed animals; they’ll die within a day. And you don’t have to send your children away; they didn’t do anything wrong. Neither did the parents. The stigma that lice have something to do with hygiene is dying, but dying very slowly.
One of the reasons that lice are so frustrating for parents is that the traditional medications used to treat them no longer work because of a genetic mutation in lice that have made them resistant to the insecticide used in traditional medications, dubbing this new strain of critters “super lice.” The latest study of “super lice” found that 98 percent of lice in 48 states are now immune to pyrethroids, the class of insecticide used in over-the-counter lice products. So, in addition to the stress of finding bugs in their children’s hair, parents spend weeks or months in a futile battle using drugstore lice products.
The good news is that there have been innovations in lice treatment on several fronts, most led by Lice Clinics of America, a company that is bringing science and technology to the world of lice removal. The company offers services at clinics using AirAllé, a Class I medical device cleared by the FDA and clinically proven to kill live lice and more than 99 percent of eggs in about an hour. The device doesn’t use any chemicals or insecticides. Instead, it uses carefully controlled warm air to dehydrate lice and eggs.
Using AirAllé, Lice Clinics of America has successfully treated some 950,000 cases of head lice in 33 counties. Lice Clinics of America also sells retail Lice Remover Kits and Lice Preventer Kits that use non-toxic, easy to use, guaranteed formulas to kill and prevent head lice.
While no one is likely to be pleased when their child has head lice, they no longer have to freak out. The condition is easy to treat at home or in a clinic setting. For more information about Lice Clinics of America products or to find a clinic, visit www.liceclinicsofamerica.com.