Q: Why would this seemingly normal family slather mayonnaise all over their heads?
A: Head Lice!
Mayonnaise is a safer (and healthier) alternative to standard lice treatments that contain chemicals and poisons. With mayonnaise, there’s no reason to rub toxic pesticides all over your child’s heads. Plus, there’s an added bonus: Mayonnaise is good for your hair, so when the mayonnaise treatment is all over, your child’s hair will be sleek and shiny and soft.
How does it work?
Mayonnaise suffocates the living head lice. However, mayonnaise does not take care of the unhatched lice safe in their nits (eggs), which get attached to human hair. As a natural lubricant, mayonnaise makes the process of combing out the nits easy. After eradicating the live lice with mayonnaise, comb out the nits with a lice comb. This “nit-picking” is crucial to prevent the remaining lice and nits from reproducing, otherwise the nits will hatch in a matter of days and you’ll have another full-on head lice invasion.
Now, some researchers contend that mayonnaise won’t actually kill head lice, but rather only stun the parasites for a few hours, leaving them dormant due to lack of oxygen, thus appearing to be dead. But don’t rule out mayonnaise just yet. Mayonnaise treatment still makes the live lice much easier to comb out (and it’s still a much safer alternative). Either way, the combing-out process is crucial to completely rid your child’s head of those pesky, blood-thirsty parasites.
Of course, this process can involve a LOT of mayonnaise, depending on how long and thick the hair is, so make sure you always have plenty of mayonnaise in stock. And for goodness’ sake, please make sure your child can contain their desire to eat the mayonnaise in their hair. Mayonnaise will turn rancid after a few hours, and once it’s rancid, the mayonnaise itself is not safe to consume!
For more information about treating head lice with mayonnaise, check out Lifehacker and Healthline.