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Lysine; L-Lysine; Lysine Hydrochloride

Proposed Uses: Herpes Simplex Prevention (Cold Sores, Genital Herpes)

Lysine is an essential amino acid, one that you need to get from food. Some evidence suggests that supplemental lysine may be able to help prevent herpes infections (cold sores and genital herpes).

Requirements/Sources
Most people need about 1 g of lysine per day. The requirement may be greater for athletes and people recovering from major injuries, especially burns. The richest sources of lysine are animal proteins such as meat and poultry, but it is also found in dairy products, eggs, and beans.

Therapeutic Dosages
A typical therapeutic dosage of lysine for herpes infections is 1 g 3 times daily. You can take this as a regular part of your diet in hopes of preventing herpes flare-ups, or, perhaps, at the first sign of an attack. Although the evidence isn't strong, there may be some advantage to restricting your intake of foods that contain a lot of arginine, such as chocolate, peanuts, other nuts and seeds, and, to a lesser extent, wheat.

Therapeutic Uses
Some small studies suggest that regular use of lysine supplements can help prevent flareups of cold sores and genital herpes, although other studies have not found benefit. 1–6 Lysine has also been proposed as a treatment to take at the onset of a flareup, but at least one study failed to find it effective for this purpose.

Both cold sores and genital herpes are caused by a virus called herpes simplex. After you are first infected, this virus hides in certain nerve cells, and reemerges under times of stress. Test tube research suggests that lysine fights this virus by blocking arginine, an amino acid the virus needs in order to replicate.  For this reason, lysine might be most effective when used in conjunction with a low-arginine diet. However, this widely stated claim has not been proven.

Safety Issues
Although lysine is an essential part of the diet, the safety of concentrated lysine supplements has not been well studied. In animal studies, high dosages have caused gallstones and elevated cholesterol levels,  so you may want to use caution when using lysine if you have either of these problems.

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