How to Treat and Prevent Wasp Stings

First: Know When It Is an Emergency

We are a pest control company, not a medical service, so this part comes first and in plain terms.

A sting inside the mouth or throat also needs urgent medical help, because swelling there can affect breathing even in someone who is not allergic. This can happen when a wasp has crawled into a drinks can or bottle.

For anything that worries you but does not look like an emergency, speak to a pharmacist, call NHS 111, or contact your GP.

Treating an Ordinary Sting

For a normal sting on the arm, hand or leg, the aim is to reduce the pain and swelling and keep the area clean.

• Move away first. Wasps near a nest may keep coming. Walk calmly away from the area before doing anything else.
• Check for a sting left behind. Wasps usually keep their sting and can sting more than once, so there is often nothing to remove. If you do see something in the skin, scrape it out sideways with a fingernail or the edge of a card rather than squeezing it.
• Wash the area with soap and water.
• Cool it. A cold compress or a bag of frozen peas wrapped in a cloth, held on for ten minutes or so, helps with swelling.
• Raise the limb if the sting is on an arm or leg.
• Do not scratch. It is tempting, and it is how a sting becomes infected.

A pharmacist can advise on painkillers, antihistamines or creams that may help, and whether they suit the person, particularly for children, pregnancy or anyone taking other medicines. Folk remedies such as vinegar or bicarbonate of soda are not worth relying on.

When to see a GP

Redness and swelling around a sting are normal and can spread a little over a day or two. See a GP or call NHS 111 if the swelling keeps getting bigger, the area becomes hot and painful with pus, you feel unwell or feverish, or the person has been stung many times. Anyone who has had a bad reaction to a sting before should talk to their GP about what to do next time.

Why Stings Increase in Late Summer

Early in the year, worker wasps are busy feeding the nest and are rarely interested in people. From around August the colony changes. The brood that fed the workers sugar is finished, and the adults go looking for sweet things elsewhere: fallen fruit, open drinks, bins and picnic food.

That is why September wasps seem so persistent. They are not more venomous; they are simply around people and food far more often. It is also why a nest you have decided to live with in June can become a different proposition by September, which our post on leaving a nest untreated looks at.

Preventing Stings Day to Day

Most stings happen when a wasp is trapped, squashed or swatted, or when someone gets close to a nest without knowing it is there.

• Do not swat. Flapping at a wasp makes a sting more likely. Stay still or move slowly away.
• Drink from a glass or use a straw outdoors, and check cans before you drink from them.
• Cover food outside and clear plates promptly.
• Keep bin lids shut and bins away from doors and seating.
• Pick up windfall fruit in late summer.
• Wear shoes on the lawn, where wasps land on clover and fallen fruit.
• Before mowing or strimming a bank or a long patch of grass, watch it for a minute for wasps rising from one spot.

Most people are stung by a wasp they did not see, near a nest they did not know about.

When the Stings Are Coming from a Nest

If people in the household are being stung repeatedly in the same part of the garden or by the same door, the problem is not the individual wasps. There is almost certainly a nest nearby. Our guide on how to identify wasp nests explains how to find the entrance without getting close.

Where someone in the home has reacted badly to a sting before, do not try to deal with a nest yourself. Tell us when you call, and we will factor it into how quickly we come. The wasp nest removal service page covers how the treatment works, and the price guide explains the £90 fixed cost. Before any treatment we tell you what we are using, where it goes, when you can use the area again and what to do with pets, and we ask you to follow those instructions. If you are thinking about tackling the nest yourself, read can I remove a wasp nest myself first.