Bee Sting Remedy

How to treat honey bee stings or a bumble bee sting? Try these bee sting remedy and first aid for bee stings to soothe a bee sting.

Unless you got stung by a swarm of bees, received multiple bee stings or are allergic to bee stings, you don't need emergency medical attention. But you still have to treat the sting immediately to reduce the common bee sting reactions such as sharp pain, redness, swelling and itching.

Bees have poison glands in their abdomens and stingers at the end section of their body. When a bee stings humans, the stinger will poke the skin and the abdomen will release the poison.

When a honey bee stings, it is unable to remove the stinger and as it tries to fly off, it will leave behind its ruptured abdomen and its stinger in the skin. And it will die.

Unlike honey bees, bumble bees do not die after stinging. Bumble bees don't have barbed stingers and are able to pull them out easily. This is one of the reasons why bumble bees can sting multiple times.

Bee sting remedy No. 1 - Remove the stinger

If a honey bee has stung you, it would have left behind its stinger inside your skin with the poison sac attached. The first aid for bee stings is to remove both the stinger and the sac immediately to stop the venom. You can pull it out using a tweezer, scrape it off with something sharp or paste a piece of tape on it and pull it off. It doesn't matter how you do it as long as the stinger is removed.

Bee sting remedy No. 2 - Use ice pack compress

Clean the affected area with soap and water or an antiseptic. Place an ice pack wrapped in a thin cloth over it and hold on to it for immediate bee sting relief. The ice pack will help reduce the pain by numbing your nerves. And it will also reduce swelling by constricting the blood vessels. Keep on doing it until the pain subsides.

Bee sting remedy No. 3 - Apply poultice

Make a paste by mixing baking soda, meat tenderizer and vinegar. Place the paste on the affected skin and cover it with a plastic and fasten it so that the poultice will stay in place. Leave it until the pain subsides further. Repeat the process if the pain persists.

Other household and natural products that you can apply directly are toothpaste, honey, tobacco that has been moistened or a paste made of mud mixed with water.

Bee sting treatment - Use pharmaceutical topical cream

If you'd rather use pharmaceutical topical product, apply cream or lotion that contains 1% hydrocortisone several times a day. Topical hydrocortisone cream has anti-pruritic or anti-itching and anti-inflammatory properties. It is also able to narrow the blood vessels and thus prevent swelling.

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