PLB wrote:
"I don’t know if anyone else does it but early in the spring I catch a few bees and sting my hand. this tests the level of my immunity and gives a boost to it at the same time. in this climate one can go six months without getting stung and sometimes the first few stings of the season cause a bit of swelling. of course,  if I became allergic this would be a safe way to find out"
I do this nowadays. Before, the first stings of the season would cause me to spend 2 days swelling and another 2 going down.  I put this to good use once when I had 'tennis elbow'. I recognised it because I'd had it before and had to wear a clamp on my arm for several months to no effect until  eventually the doctor gave me a cortisone injection which was painful but cured it in a couple of days.
This time, in late winter when I hadn't  been stung for months, I took the sharp end of a bee and applied it to the painful point, counting up to 120 slowly to  get a full dose. It hurt!  As described above I swelled etc but when it was over so was the tennis elbow and it didn't come back.  It seems that the sting stimulates the body to produce its own cortisone.
Chris

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