News-Letter

Herbs do not have the negative side effects that drugs have. Rather they have positive side effects. Plants (herbs) contain thousands of phytochemicals that help health like lutein and zeaxanthin in spinach preventing blindness in old age from macular degeneration.

Over 900 phytochemicals have been identified so far. In fact JHU has identified sulforaphane in broccoli sprouts as a powerful cancer fighter. They bred broccoli extra high in it and have patented this broccoli.

Many chemicals from plants have been made into drugs like quinine from the cinchona tree. Some of the harmful organisms develop resistance to the drugs, but do not develop resistance to the plants. Broccoli sprouts (a plant food or herb) have other chemicals in it, besides sulforaphane that also fight cancer.

This is a great opportunity for the students to try something else that is a lot older than traditional medicine. Chinese medicine has been using herbs for 5,000 years.

In 1998 the government created the 27th National Institute of Health, the NCCAM. NCCAM stands for National Center of Complimentary and Alternative Medicine. Among other things, it studies herbs. It even mentions how the herb, cats claw, has been used to treat cancer in South America.

Of the thousands of phytochemicals that are in plant foods, they have already identified over 900 of them including resveratrol in grapes, lycopene in tomatoes and curcumin in the herb or spice tumeric.