Incredible Healing Properties Of Active Manuka Honey
Honey has been used throughout the ages as a medicinal treatment for wounds and other topical skin conditions. We don’t know even-handed when early man discovered the healing properties of honey, but evidence has been found to indicate that honey was used as an antibacterial agency by ancient Egyptians thousands of years before bacteria were discovered to be the cause of infections.
One of our first written accounts of using honey as a healing instrumentality comes from Aristotle, who wrote that unobscured honey was a good emollient for sore eyes and wounds. A Greek physician, pharmacologist and zoologist named Pedanius Dioscorides, who practiced in Rome around the time of Nero, traveled extensively throughout the Greek and Roman empires in search of medicinal substances. He is famous for writing a five hamlet book, De Materia Medica, which is a kingpin to all voguish pharmacopeias and continues to this day to be one of the most influential books on herbal remedies in history. In his writings, Dioscorides described honey as being " good for all rotten and cave ulcers ".
Honey was still being used to treat wounds up through World Contention II, but with the sensation of penicillin and other Twentieth Century antibiotic drugs, the natural antibacterial properties of honey have mostly been overlooked. Until recently.
Today we are inflowing enhanced age of enlightenment. We are enjoying a rebirth of natural remedies and ingredients in response to the risks presented by iffy chemical ingredients in products that encircle the food we eat, the containers we use to box our food, and most recently the cosmetics and skin care we much slather on our cats.
Coupled with evidence that our super drugs and soaps are actually maturing the risks to ourselves and our children by stimulating the natural enlargement of super - bugs – bacteria that are becoming resistant to even the strongest of our antibacterials – the shift to effective natural remedies is becoming a stampede.
Honey has been found to inhibit some 60 style of bacteria. It also exhibits an antifungal response on some yeasts and genre of Aspergillus and Penicillium, two of the most common. Dr. Andrew Weil says in his November, 2006 newsletter Self Healing “Honey’s antibacterial properties, due in part to its hydrogen peroxide content, help to quickly clear an infection and prevent new ones from developing. Honey stimulates the growth of skin tissue, reduces inflammation, and minimizes scarring, and it has the too many benefit of creating a smoother surface between the slash and flavouring. Since the gash is less likely to stick to the bandage, removing it is easier and less severe, and damage to the newly grown skin tissue is avoided. ”
“One recent review of 22 clinical trouble through that honey typically shortened healing time on many types of wounds and provided people with better pain relief than antifungal creams or antibiotics ( International Journal of Lower Extremity Wounds, Pace 2006 ). In Bonn, Germany, researchers found that a product called Medihoney ( which is waiting for FDA attempt in the United States ) can heal some wounds faster than most antibiotics ( Effectual Care in Cancer, January 2006 ). Medihoney is made of different types of honey native to New Zealand and Australia, including manuka honey, which has a particularly well-built antibacterial effect. Honey can also be a useful treatment for people who have built up a tolerance to certain antibiotics. ( I know of no evidence that honey helps to heal slash when stale as a sweetener. ) ”
The study Dr. Weil refers to included 22 trouble involving 2, 062 patients treated with honey, as well as an additional 16 tragedy that were performed on seen animals. Honey was found to be beneficial as a nick relish in the following ways:
• Honey ' s antibacterial quality not only fast clears existing infection, it protects wounds from more infection
• Honey debrides wounds and removes malodor
• Honey ' s anti - inflammatory exercise reduces edema and minimizes scarring
• Honey stimulates growth of granulation and epithelial tissues to speed healing
The review article for the study was written by Dr. Peter Molan, director of the Honey Research Unit at New Zealand ' s University of Waikato. Dr. Molan says " All honey is antibacterial, being the bees add an enzyme that makes hydrogen peroxide, but we still temple ' t managed to identify the active components. All we know is ( the honey ) works on an quite broad spectrum. "
Dr. Molan’s research has shown that honey made from the flowers of the Manuka tree ( Leptospermum scoparium ), a bushy tree native to New Zealand, has antibacterial properties that are much higher than any other honeys’. In fact, Dr. Molan estimates that active manuka honey could exhibit healing properties up to 100 times more than other honeys.
Dr. Molan says " In all honeys, there is, to different levels, hydrogen peroxide produced from an enzyme that bees add to the nectar. In manuka honey, there ' s something else besides the hydrogen peroxide. And there ' s nix like that ever been found anywhere else in the world. We know it has a very broad spectrum of vim. It works on bacteria, fungi, protozoa. We refuge ' t found creature it doesn ' t work on among infectious organisms. "
After nineteen years of research, the “something else” Dr. Molan refers to remains unknown. He has been unable to identify it, even while observing its substance by comparing the healing properties of other honeys with manuka honey. But he has given the unknown ingredient a name: unique manuka thing, or UMF.
Dr. Molan says UMF manuka honey can even grip antibiotic - strapping strains of bacteria. " Staphylococcus aureas is the most common slash - infecting sort of bacteria, and that ' s the most hypersensitive to honey that we ' ve found. And that includes the antibiotic strapping strains - the MRSA - which is just as loath to honey as any other staphylococcus aureas. "
According to the University of Waikato, there are four main components that translate the natural antibacterial movement of honey.
1. Osmotic outcome: The high sugar gay of honey means that there are very few water molecules available manufacture it difficult for micro - organisms to rivet. In precisely ripened honey, no yeast genre are live to grow and the growth of many genre of bacteria is fairly inhibited.
2. Acidity: The pH of honey is characteristically completely low ( 3. 2 - 4. 5 ), which is low enough to inhibit many ill-favored pathogens and in consequence be a meaning antibacterial makin's.
3. Hydrogen Peroxide: When bees are turning nectar to honey they hush up a glucose oxidase enzyme. One of the by products of the capable alacrity is hydrogen peroxide. When honey is diluted enzyme labor increases giving a ' serene cessation ' antiseptic at a level which is antibacterial but not tissue unprosperous.
4. Phytochemical Factors: The large-scale factors cannot report for all of the antibacterial activity practical. There have been several chemicals with antibacterial action isolated in honey ( take notice Waikato Honey Research Unit ' s website for fresh information ) by various researchers. This may bring out the high level of motion heuristic in Manuka honey.
The University’s Honey Research Unit adds “Honey has an antibacterial movement, due primarily to hydrogen peroxide formed in a " slow - release " manner by the enzyme glucose oxidase coeval in honey, which can vary widely in potency. Some honeys are no more antibacterial than sugar, while others can be diluted more than 100 - commune and still halt the growth of bacteria. The difference in potency of antibacterial exertion found among the different honeys is more than 100 - canton. ” Active Manuka honey has the highest antibacterial exertion ever experimental in a honey.
Apicare / Honey & Herbs Ltd of Auckland, New Zealand, recognized the healing benefits of applying manuka honey to the epidermis and created an entire line of products that incorporate the antibacterial properties to their best advantage. Apicare’s wares of lotions, balms, creams, moisturizers, shampoos and conditioners all use Active manuka honey as a base. Not surprisingly, the results are as astonishing as the research would seem to predict.
2006 marks the first duration that Apicare’s Manuka honey personal care products are being offered in the United States. Apicare. net is the exclusive distributor for their entire line of products in the US – which comprises eleven separate and distinct multi - product commodities – all based on Active manuka honey. Consumers can find Apicare products in stores throughout the country and Apicare publician Pam Reade says, “If your store doesn’t take our products, dependable request. They will soon. ”
Customers who are Internet savvy can purchase any more from the one website in the US that sells at the retail level right away to tribe – Vashon Organics. Senior Partner at Vashon Organics, Desiree Nelson, says “The Apicare line is neatly incredible. We have never heuristic a product like this before – a personal care line that can repair your skin while it soothes and smoothes. ”
