How To Use Olive Oil For Head Lice

What you need and how to use olive oil for head lice.Here’s the thing about lice – once you’re infested, there’s a long battle ahead of you to get rid of them. That’s something you probably don’t want to hear considering they make your head extremely itchy and are quite an embarrassment to bear. Now, there are quite a few over-the-counter head lice treatments that you can buy. However, these contain mild insecticides like permethrin and pyrethrin that can cause mild to severe skin irritation. This is why it’s best to use a natural ingredient to get rid of those pesky little buggers! Which one, you ask? Olive oil, of course!.

Insecticides can cause mild to severe skin irritation. It’s best to use a natural ingredient like olive oil to get rid of those buggers.

Here’s how olive oil works at killing head lice. Harvard School of Public Health conducted a test that found that lice that were submerged in olive oil died of asphyxiation after 2 hours. Similar studies found that it took at least 8 hours for head lice to die of suffocation after being coated with olive oil. So, the key takeaway here is that you need to apply olive oil over your hair and scalp to ensure that you’re coating the head lice in this process and cutting off their oxygen supply. And how exactly do you do that? Here’s how….

• Olive oil
• Clarifying shampoo
• Nit removal comb
• Paper towels
• Trash bag
• Blow dryer.

Start off by washing your hair with clarifying shampoo to remove any product residue from your hair. This step is important as this residue prevents olive oil from sticking to your hair shafts and reduces its effectiveness.Apply olive oil all over your hair and scalp, making sure they are completely saturated. You can divide your hair into several sections while doing this to make the job easier for you.Tie your hair up in a bun and put on your shower cap. Make sure that the elastic of the shower cap is tight enough to sit securely around your head. This will prevent the lice from escaping.Leave your oiled hair in the shower cap for 4-6 hours.

Remove the shower cap and comb out the lice with a nit removal comb. Keep cleaning the comb with paper towels at regular intervals and dispose them off in the trash bag to prevent the lice from escaping.Once you’re certain that you’ve removed all the lice that you could, wash and shampoo your hair twice. Divide your hair into sections and blow dry it close to the scalp in medium heat to kill the nits.Follow this routine 2-3 times a week until your hair is completely free of head lice.

While olive oil by itself is a pretty effective remedy against head lice, there are a few other natural ingredients that you can use it with that can increase its anti-lice benefits.