★★★★☆
Grapefruit Seed Extract (GSE) applied directly to a wart, topped with GSE on the cotton of a bandaid, and secured by athletic tape was the painless and easy remedy for a thumb on one son's thumb and plantar warts on my other son's feet. Duct tape was too much of a pain and was too obvious.
My 7 yo son developed a pea-sized wart on palm side of his thumb. I just put a few drops of GSE on it and made sure to keep it covered 24/7 with a bandaid and that's all it took. After the core turned black and was removed with tweezers, we continued to put GSE in the hole where the wart was until it filled in, so maybe a week or so? No pain and no scar and it's been over a year with no return.
Plantar warts have been a much harder process. Almost two months ago, my other son told me his feet hurt. I took a look and there were clusters of small to large plantar warts on both feet. I think he got them from the locker room floor at school since I've learned that several of his friends also have them. I'm not sure if it is because there were so many or if it's because plantar warts are so difficult to treat, but it's been about 6 weeks since I first started putting GSE on them and he's finally down to 2 as of tonight. To be honest, there were so many and it took quite awhile to clean, treat, and bandage his feet that I wasn't very consistent during the first 3-4 weeks or so and I'm sure that had a lot to do with the slow progress during that time. About two weeks ago I realized summer was pretty much here and he couldn't go barefoot anywhere, so I got serious and filed off as much of the top layer of each wart as I could without hurting him. (I immediately threw the callous file away since it was contagious.) Then I slathered the entire area with GSE and let it sit for a few minutes and put several drops GSE on the cotton part of several bandaids and covered the entire. Then I secured the whole area with athletic tape on top of the bandaids to make sure it stayed put until the next night. This had an immediate effect and the largest one was almost gone within the week. That foot completely cleared a few days ago and the holes are almost filled back in with healthy skin already. Now I'm just down to two small ones under his other toe. I'll keep at it every day and both feet should be completely clear within a few more days. I think more than anything, filing the top layer off and consistent treatment with plenty of GSE and covering the entire area is what made the difference. So thankful this is a painless remedy since I had a friend get hers burned off and she was in so much pain that she had trouble walking for over a week - and they are already starting to return and it's been less than a year!
Pros: no pain, no scars, natural, warts don't seem to come back if treated uncovered for a bit after wart removed and healthy skin is present
Cons: can take awhile, daily treatment is time consuming on a large area like feet, have to keep bandaged during treatment
PS. Don't forget to wear clean socks at ALL times and sanitize the shower floor after EACH use to prevent spreading the virus to healthy skin and/or other people.
