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What Pharmaceutical Companies

Don't Want You To Know About Herbal Medicine!

 

by Danny Siegenthaler

 

Herbs or medicinal plants have a long history in treating disease. In

traditional Chinese medicine, for example, the written history of herbal

medicine goes back over 2000 years and herbalists in the West have used

“weeds” equally long to treat that which ails us. We are all familiar

with the virtues of Garlic, Chamomile, Peppermint, Lavender, and other

common herbs.

 

Interest in medicinal herbs is on the rise again and the interest is

primarily from the pharmaceutical industry, which is always looking for

‘new drugs’ and more effective substances to treat diseases, for which

there may be no or very few drugs available.

 

Considering the very long traditional use of herbal medicines and the

large body of evidence of their effectiveness, why is it that we are not

generally encouraged to use traditional herbal medicine, instead of

synthetic, incomplete copies of herbs, called drugs, considering the

millions of dollars being spent looking for these seemingly elusive

substances?

 

Herbs are considered treasures when it comes to ancient cultures and

herbalists, and many so-called weeds are worth their weight in gold.

Dandelion, Comfrey, Digitalis (Foxglove), the Poppy, Milk Thistle,

Stinging nettle, and many others, have well-researched and established

medicinal qualities that have few, if any, rivals in the pharmaceutical

industry. Many of them, in fact, form the bases of pharmaceutical drugs.

 

Research into the medicinal properties of such herbs as the humble

Dandelion is currently being undertaken by scientists at the Royal

Botanical Gardens, in Kew, west London, who believe it could be the

source of a life-saving drug for cancer patients.

 

Early tests suggest that it could hold the key to warding off cancer,

which kills tens of thousands of people every year.

 

Their work on the cancer-beating properties of the dandelion, which also

has a history of being used to treat warts, is part of a much larger

project to examine the natural medicinal properties of scores of British

plants and flowers.

 

Professor Monique Simmonds, head of the Sustainable Uses of Plants Group

at Kew, said: " We aren't randomly screening plants for their potential

medicinal properties, we are looking at plants which we know have a long

history of being used to treat certain medical problems.

 

“We will be examining them to find out what active compounds they

contain which can treat the illness. "

 

Unfortunately, as is so often the case, this group of scientists appears

to be looking for active ingredients, which can later be synthesized and

then made into pharmaceutical drugs. This is not the way herbs are used

traditionally and their functions inevitably change when the active

ingredients are used in isolation. That’s like saying that the only

important part of a caris the engine – nothing else needs to be included.

 

So, why is there this need for isolating the ‘active ingredients’?

 

As a scientist, I can understand the need for the scientific process of

establishing the fact that a particular herb works on a particular

disease, pathogen or what ever, and the need to know why and how it does

so. But, and this is a BIG but, as a doctor of Chinese medicine I also

understand the process of choosing and prescribing COMBINATIONS of

herbs, which have a synergistic effect to treat not just the disease,

but any underlying condition as well as the person with the disease.

That is a big difference and not one that is easily tested using

standard scientific methodologies.

 

Using anecdotal evidence, which after all has a history of thousands of

years, seems to escape my esteemed colleagues all together. Rather than

trying to isolate the active ingredient(s), why not test these herbs,

utilizing the knowledge of professional herbalists, on patients in vivo,

using the myriad of technology available to researchers and medical

diagnosticians to see how and why these herbs work in living, breathing

patients, rather than in a test tube or on laboratory rats and mice

(which, by the way, are not humans and have a different, although some

what similar, physiology to us)?

 

I suspect, that among the reasons for not following the above procedure

is that the pharmaceutical companies are not really interested in the

effects of the medicinal plants as a whole, but rather in whether they

can isolate a therapeutic substance which can then be manufactured

cheaply and marketed as a new drug - and of course that’s where the

money is.

 

The problem with this approach is, however, that medicinal plants like

Comfrey, Dandelion and other herbs usually contain hundreds if not

thousands of chemical compounds that interact, yet many of which are not

yet understood and cannot be manufactured. This is why the manufactured

drugs, based on so-called active ingredients, often do not work or

produce side effects.

 

Aspirin is a classic case in point. Salicylic acid is the active

ingredient in Aspirin tablets, and was first isolated from the bark of

the White Willow tree. It is a relatively simple compound to make

synthetically, however, Aspirin is known for its ability to cause

stomach irritation and in some cases ulceration of the stomach wall.

 

The herbal extract from the bark of the White Willow tree generally does

not cause stomach irritation due to other, so called ‘non-active

ingredients’ contained in the bark, which function to protect the lining

of the stomach thereby preventing ulceration of the stomach wall.

 

Ask yourself, which would I choose: Side effects, or no site effects?

It’s a very simple answer. Isn’t it?

 

So why then are herbal medicines not used more commonly and why do we

have pharmaceutical impostors stuffed down our throats? The answer is,

that there’s little or no money in herbs for the pharmaceutical

companies. They, the herbs, have already been invented, they grow

easily, they multiply readily and for the most part, they’re freely

available.

 

Further more, correctly prescribed and formulated herbal compounds

generally resolve the health problem of the patient over a period of

time, leaving no requirement to keep taking the preparation – that means

no repeat sales. No ongoing prescriptions, no ongoing problem.

 

Pharmaceuticals on the other hand primarily aim to relieve symptoms –

that means: ongoing consultations, ongoing sales, ongoing health

problems. Which do you think is a more profitable proposition?

 

Don’t get me wrong, this is not to say that all drugs are impostors or

that none of the pharmaceutical drugs cure diseases or maladies – they

do and some are life-preserving preparations and are without doubt

invaluable. However, herbal extracts can be similarly effective, but are

not promoted and are highly under-utilized.

 

The daily news is full of ‘discoveries’ of herbs found to be a possible

cure of this or that, as in the example of Dandelion and its possible

anti-cancer properties. The point is that these herbs need to be

investigated in the correct way. They are not just ‘an active

ingredient’. They mostly have hundreds of ingredients and taking one or

two in isolation is not what makes medicinal plants work. In addition,

rarely are herbal extracts prescribed by herbalists as singles (a

preparation which utilizes only one herb). Usually herbalists mix a

variety of medicinal plants to make a mixture, which addresses more than

just the major symptoms.

 

In Chinese medicine, for example, there is a strict order of hierarchy

in any herbal prescription, which requires considerable depth of

knowledge and experience on the physician's part. The fact that the

primary or principle herb has active ingredients, which has a specific

physiological effect, does not mean the other herbs are not necessary in

the preparation. This is a fact seemingly ignored by the pharmaceutical

industry in its need to manufacture new drugs that can control disease.

 

Knowing that medicinal plants are so effective, that these plants

potentially hold the key to many diseases, are inexpensive and have

proven their worth time and time again over millennia, why is it that

herbal medicine is still not in the forefront of medical treatments, and

is considered by many orthodox, medical professionals and pharmaceutical

companies as hocus-pocus, hmmm?

 

_________________

 

Danny and Susan Siegenthaler have extensive experience as practitioners

of Chinese medicine and as medical herbalists. They both have Bachelor

of Science degrees, as well as several degrees in various modalities of

alternative medicine. Together they have over 40 years of combined

clinical experience and have taught hundreds of students.

 

Their Website www.wildcrafted.com.au, Natural Skin Care Products by

Wildcrafted Herbal Products provides information

© 2005, © 2006 OfSpirit

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