Ancient Herb Wormwood Kills Cancer Options

[G&C]

Ancient Herb Wormwood Kills Cancer
by Hiyaguha Cohen

Here's a blow to the idea that modern medicine is actually "modern." Back in the '70s, a research team on an archeological dig in China discovered a medicinal recipe dating back more than 2,000 years to 163 B.C. The recipe featured an extract from a leafy herb, called wormwood, that the ancients used to cure malaria, hemorrhoids, and parasitic infections. In subsequent tests, scientists discovered that the extract, which they named artemisinin, has remarkable anti-inflammatory and anti-parasitic properties. They also found that artemisinin cures malaria almost 100 percent of the time and that in combination with iron, destroys cancer cells.

Artemisinin works by releasing an avalanche of free radicals when exposed to an oxidizing agent like iron. The free radicals attack and kill iron-rich cells. Since cancer cells tend to contain much more iron than normal cells do, they are particularly attractive to artemisinin. When exposed to cancer cells artemisinin gets activated and sends out free radicals that attack those cells, destroying the cancer in the process. This effect can be amplified by sending additional iron to cancer cells. (Similarly, since the malaria parasite lives in iron-rich blood, when exposed to artemisinin, free radicals attack the blood and destroy the parasite in the process.)

The FDA hasn't approved the use of artemisinin as an anti-cancer agent, as "research on artemisinin and cancer is still in very early stages." And yet, plenty of studies out there support the effectiveness and relative safety of artemisinin. For instance, a 2005 study out of the University of Washington targeted cancer cells by "tagging" artemisinin to an iron-carrying glycoprotein that cancer cells readily absorb. The researchers found that by doing this, the artemisinin became "very potent and selective in killing [leukemia] cells."

Another study, in 2006, found that artemisinin killed precancerous cells before those cells could develop into a breast tumor. In that study, rats were fed a substance known to cause breast cancer. Then, half the rats were fed a normal diet and the other half consumed food laced with artemisinin. After nine months, 96 percent of the rats fed the normal diet developed tumors, compared to only 57 percent of the rats fed artemisinin, plus their tumors were smaller and fewer.

Similar studies have found artemisinin to be highly effective in killing cancer cells that resist radiation and different forms of chemotherapy. In fact, a 2001 study published in Oncology found that by pre-loading cancer cells with iron and then administering artemisinin, the cancer killing effectiveness was almost 100 percent within 24 hours.

So what's the catch? Skeptics claim that high doses can cause neurological effects and heart blockage -- but those effects are extremely rare and show up only at very high doses. In fact, artemisinin has been used in Asia for decades now with virtually no evidence of toxicity. And in large-scale studies on monkeys who received enormous doses equivalent to 20,000 milligrams, no toxicity at all surfaced.

So artemisinin appears to be much safer than most pharmaceuticals out there, and far, far, more benign than the typical chemotherapeutic agent -- although it isn't a standalone solution. Artemisinin needs to be part of an overall approach incorporating diet, enzymatic therapy, immune system building, supplementation, cleansing and detoxification. If you're interested, Dr. Lam provides some guidelines for using artemisinin on his Insider's Guide to Natural Medicine website.

[Jack Batemaster]

… high doses can cause neurological effects and heart blockage …show up only at very high doses …

Attention Abstomph !

[Artemis]

If you're interested, Dr. Lam provides some guidelines for using artemisinin on his Insider's Guide to Natural Medicine website.

The example set by the French soldiers in Africa is guideline enough for me.

_______ needs to be part of an overall approach incorporating diet, enzymatic therapy, immune system building, supplementation, cleansing and detoxification.

Fill in the blank with many an illegal or slandered substance and you've got yourself a cure. Fill it with a high-dollar pharmaceutical and forget about the rest of that crap; just pay up, swallow, and make out a will.

[Jaded Prole]

Artemisinin is derived from Artemisia annua. I haven't found any report that it can be found in Artemisia Absinthium.


I agree about the other slandered substances. All should be legal.

[Artemis]

Absinthe.
Africa.
Malaria.
Wormwood.
Seemed like a reasonable conclusion.

[Tibro]

Reasonable, for someone who doesn't source their A.a. from asia.

There are other forms of the herb wormwood such as Artemisia absinthium (absinth sagewort or common wormwood) but they do not contain the active artemisinin compound. Even subspecies of Artemesia annua may contain different concentrations of artemisinin. The subspecia that gives the highest yield (~0.4%) is found in southwestern China and Vietnam.

Artemisinin is the active natural extract from the herb. It is not at all water-soluble

I wonder how it tastes.

[Provenance]

I wonder if Artemisinin is found in artemisia pontica and, if so, is it extracted during coloring?

Anyone around here handy with GC-MS analysis…?

[Tibro]

Edited for simplicity.

There are other forms of the herb wormwood … but they do not contain the active artemisinin compound.

Even with GCMS you'd have to know what the signature for artemisinin looks like and hope it wasn't masked or coincidental with another compound.

[Tibro]

Having picked a bucketload of antioxidant berries today (aronia) I'm surprised to learn that free radicals can have such positive effects on health. The reports of their harmfulness are everywhere but I've never heard anything like this, so it really is fascinating news to me.

I wonder if a steady diet of aronia pie spiced with Artemisia annua will allow me to live forever?

[Provenance]

Free radicals can be a cause of cancer.

[Artemis]

So just whip up a batch with Asian wormwood; you won't find out anything but how it smells in a drink. Mugwort smells better than absinthium, so who knows. Much absinthe was exported to Vietnam from France back in the day; I'd be surprised if nobody has ever tried it.

[Jaded Prole]

Richters stocks it

[Artemis]

For what it's worth, qīng hāo is (I think) green (qīng) celery wormwood (hāo). Qīng hāo sù is green celery wormwood essence (artemisinin). But celery wormwood is apparently Artemisia carvifolia. Obviously, as with the various genepis in Switzerland and Italy, you only know what you've really got when you know it, and the people in the next valley may call it something else.

[Tibro]

Apparently it's also been used in conjunction with Lyme disease.

Although sweet wormwoodʼs constituent, artemisinin, is felt to be the chemically active ingredient as an antimicrobial, the whole plant (which contains numerous other components) seems to be therapeutically effective, without the side effects often reported when taking artemisinin by itself. Sweet wormwood, with its broad spectrum of antimicrobial actions, makes it a targeted herb in the treatment of Lyme disease. As Stephen Harrod Buhner states, “The herb is exceptionally potent in that it spreads quickly throughout the body and it easily crosses the blood/brain barrier. Because it infuses the blood, it is carried throughout the body to every cell, all of which need blood to live.” (Healing Lyme: Natural Healing and Prevention of Lyme Borreliosis and Its Coinfections. Silver City, NM: Raven Press; 2005:183.)

[Kirk]

One year Sweet Annie went up to $650 a pound, I knew it was a cure so I decided to grow it. I grew about 250 plants, let it flower, cut and hauled it up to the sequester. When I cut it I knew something was wrong, my skin crawled, I teared up and I couldn't breath. The smell is cloying to the point of irritation. After it was dry it was so nasty I put a mask on, tossed it all down and burned it. To this day that stuff sprouts up everywhere on the place and even a tender young sprout has such a powerful smell it makes me gag. I would not use it in absinthe, I wouldn't use it in Ipecac.