Mullein grows wild across West Virginia and has a long history of use for coughs, sore throats and respiratory issues. Wade T. Smith, APRN, FNP-BC, shows how to identify a young plant, explains what its saponins and mucilage do, and covers how to make and strain mullein tea.
Video Transcript
Soon it’s going to be wintertime, and we’re going to start seeing colds and flus. There’s a plant out here in West Virginia called mullein. This is a young plant. You can tell because it has a rosette to it. The mature plant has a long stem. It can get as high as eight feet.
Native Americans and the settlers used this for coughs, sore throats and respiratory issues. The plant contains saponins and mucilage. Saponins help break up mucus. They help bring mucus up out of the lungs. The mucilage helps calm sore throats and irritated tissue.
You can make a tea out of this for respiratory treatment. You want to make sure that you strain it very well, because the leaves have very fine hairs on them that can be irritating if you don’t filter them out.
Mullein is right here in our backyard. Something for a sore throat, something for respiratory issues, something for a cough.
