Wasp and bee stings: 8 French grandmother home remedies

A sting hurts, it frightens people, and for the great majority of us it is over in a day. The point of this page is to make that day easier, and to be very clear about the small number of cases where none of it applies.

So we start with those.

Before anything else: the signs that mean you call 911

Do not treat, do not wait, do not look for a remedy. Call 911 immediately if the person has:

• trouble breathing, wheezing or shortness of breath;
• swelling anywhere on the face or in the mouth;
• throat tightness or difficulty swallowing;
• feeling weak, faint or lightheaded;
• turning blue;
• a rash or flushing spreading beyond the sting, chest pain, abdominal pain or vomiting.

Those are the signs MedlinePlus lists for a severe reaction to a sting, and they can come on fast.

Three more situations that mean 911 whatever the skin is doing:

• a sting inside the mouth or the throat, because the swelling alone can close the airway;
• many stings at once, more than about 5 in a child or 20 in an adult;
• any sting in someone who has had a serious reaction before.

If you have been prescribed an epinephrine auto-injector, use it at the first sign of a reaction, then call 911. Use it first and call second: the injection is what buys the time. MedlinePlus is direct about carrying one: if you know you have severe allergic reactions to stings, “carry an emergency epinephrine kit”. Nothing further down this page is a substitute for it, and using it early is not an overreaction.

The stinger, and the mistake almost everyone makes

A honeybee leaves its stinger behind. A wasp usually does not, which is also why a wasp can sting more than once.

If a stinger is there, get it out fast, and get it out the right way. MedlinePlus says to “remove the stinger by scraping the back of a credit card or other straight-edged object across the stinger”, and warns against tweezers, which “may squeeze the venom sac and increase the amount of venom released”.

A fingernail works as well as a card. What matters is scraping rather than pinching.

Cold, and it comes before everything else

Wrap ice in a clean washcloth and hold it on the sting. MedlinePlus gives the rhythm: “place ice (wrapped in a washcloth) on the site of the sting for 10 minutes and then off for 10 minutes. Repeat this process.”

Never ice straight onto skin.

Cold numbs the area and calms the swelling, and it is the one thing here that works on every sting and every bite. It is the same first gesture as for mosquito bites and for a sunburn, for the same reason.

Baking soda paste

Mix 1 teaspoon (5 g) of baking soda with 3 to 5 drops of water to make a thick paste. Spread it over the sting and let it dry for a few minutes before rinsing.

This is the classic American kitchen answer and a French one too, which is unusual enough to be worth noting. It is cheap, it is in every cupboard, and it stays where you put it.

The apple cider vinegar and sugar paste

Mix 2 tablespoons (1 oz / 30 ml) of apple cider vinegar with 2 teaspoons of brown sugar to make a thick paste. Hold it on the sting for 5 to 10 minutes, then rinse with lukewarm water.

The sugar is there for a practical reason, not a medicinal one: it thickens the mix so it stays on the skin instead of running off. Grandmothers were solving a problem of adhesion.

On unbroken skin only, and skip it if the sting has been scratched open.

A cold slice of lemon

Hold a cold slice of lemon against the sting for 10 to 15 minutes.

It is the simplest version of the acid-and-cold idea, and the one you can do at a picnic table with what is on it.

Wash the area afterwards and keep it out of the sun. Lemon juice on skin in strong sunlight can leave a burn-like mark, which on a summer afternoon is a real risk rather than a theoretical one.

Plantain leaves

Pick two or three fresh ribwort or broadleaf plantain leaves, crush them lightly between your fingers, and hold them on the sting for 10 minutes.

Plantain is the flat, parallel-veined weed growing in the lawn, not the banana-like fruit. It is worth learning to recognize, because it is usually growing within a few feet of wherever you got stung, and it is the same leaf French grandmothers reached for on mosquito bites.

A slice of onion

Cut a fresh onion and hold a slice on the sting for 5 to 10 minutes.

The same onion that goes into the onion and honey cough syrup has been laid on stings for generations. We are passing on the practice, not making a claim about the sulfur compounds it contains.

Green clay

Mix 1 tablespoon of green clay with a little cold water to make a paste, spread it on the sting and let it dry for 20 minutes before rinsing.

This is the most French item on the page. Green clay is in every bathroom cupboard there and in almost none here, which makes it the one remedy on this list you may have to go looking for.

Spike lavender essential oil

Mix 1 drop of spike lavender essential oil (Lavandula latifolia) with 1 drop of coconut oil and dab it on the area, 2 to 3 times a day.

Not for children under 6, not during pregnancy or breastfeeding, and not for anyone allergic to essential oils.

A word about what we can source here, because it matters. The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health has a page on lavender, and it notes that topical lavender products “may cause allergic skin reactions” and that “little is known about whether it’s safe to use lavender during pregnancy or while breastfeeding.” That page is about lavender in general, not about spike lavender specifically, which is a different species from the one in most bottles. So: try it on a small patch first, and treat this as the traditional remedy it is.

After the first day

Expect redness, swelling and itching for a day or two. Some people get a large local swelling, a whole forearm rather than a coin-sized patch, which is uncomfortable and alarming but not the same thing as an allergic reaction.

Call your doctor if the swelling keeps spreading after 48 hours, if the site becomes hot, tender and increasingly red several days later, which can mean infection, or if you feel unwell in any way you cannot explain.

And if you have ever had more than a local reaction to a sting, that is worth a conversation with your doctor when you are not in the middle of one. It is the appointment that ends with a prescription for the auto-injector mentioned at the top of this page.

FAQ

Is a wasp sting different from a bee sting?

For treatment, barely. The practical difference is the stinger: a honeybee leaves hers behind and it should be scraped out at once, a wasp usually does not and can sting again. Everything below that point on this page applies to both.

Does the old trick of rubbing the sting with an onion actually do something?

We can tell you it has been done in French households for as long as anyone can remember, and that the cold slice does at least some of what an ice cube does. Beyond that we would be inventing a mechanism, so we will not.

My whole arm swelled up. Is that an allergy?

Not necessarily. A large local reaction around the sting is common and can take a couple of days to settle. What signals an allergy is what happens away from the sting: breathing, the face and mouth, the throat, faintness. Those are the signs at the top of this page, and they mean emergency care.