Nathaniel Altman - The Honey Prescription: The Amazing Power of Honey as Medicine

This book is dedicated with affection to my aunt and uncle, Mildred and Michael I. Aissen.

Disclaimer

The author of this book is not a physician. The following material is presented in the spirit of historical, philosophical, and scientific inquiry and is not offered as medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment of any kind. Those who wish to treat themselves with honey to cure a serious infection or other major health problem should do so only under the supervision of a qualified health care practitioner.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank the following individuals for sending me copies of their research papers: Ali Al-Jabri, Joy Bardy, Shona Blair, Phil G. Bowler, Katrina Brudzynski, Neil Burton, Dee Carter, Rose Cooper, Ilteris Ensen, Jed W. Fahey, Peter Gallman, lk Yapucu Gnes, Ronald Ingle, Diane Langemo, Ahmad Mansour, Eraldo Medeiros Costa-Neto, Thangam Menon, Subramanian Natarajan, Aykut Misirlioglu, Rosa Ana Perez martin, Faisal Rauf, Arne Simon, Peter Taormina, Alex Tonks, and Jenny Wilkinson.

I also thank the following for providing (and for permission to use) illustrations: The Town of Fahler, Alberta, for the Worlds Biggest Bee photo; Ronald Appleton of Appleton Galleries (Vancouver, BC) and Rupert Scow Jr. for permission to reproduce the photograph of Mr. Scows wonderful Bee mask, along with thanks to Sara Wark for taking the photo.

I would also like to thank the following members of my family and my friends for their encouragement, ideas, and support: Judith L. Aissen, Rudy Chapman, Edward Gasser, Mark E. Graboyes, Elizabeth and John Sell, Shi-Wei Shei, and Vincent Hsieh.

I am grateful to my literary agent, Stephany Evans of FinePrint Literary Management in New York City, who inspired me to write this book, for her continuous support and suggestions during its preparation.

Finally, special thanks go to Dr. Peter C. Molan, director of the Honey Research Unit at the University of Waikato in New Zealand, for his generosity in supplying me with research material and for his many hours of consultation and advice.

Worlds biggest bee. Photo courtesy of the Town ofFahler (Alberta, Canada).

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Like many people, Im fascinated by honeybees and have been since childhood. I grew up on a three-acre rocky farm in upstate New York, with early memories of a rustic beehive that the previous owners attached to an old locust tree at the edge of our property. Every spring the bees would leave the hive and visit the blossoming peach trees, apple trees, and blackberry bushes on the hill behind our farmhouse. We also found them taking nectar from the forsythia, lilac, and rose bushes that bloomed in the yard. Like most boys raised in the country, my brother and I built lookouts and forts and often hiked through the property, where invariably wed cross paths with bees and wasps. Yet unlike the wasps and yellow jackets that would often pursue and sometimes sting us, the honeybees tended to go about their business and left us alone.

Over the years I have written a number of books about natural and alternative healing, and my book The Oxygen Prescription (Healing Arts Press, 2007) focused on the therapeutic value of ozone and hydrogen peroxide. Our body naturally produces small amounts of hydrogen peroxide to help protect us from disease. Hydrogen peroxide not only helps oxygenate the body but also has the capacity to stimulate oxidative enzymes or proteins that accelerate oxidative reactions. They, in turn, can destroy viruses and bacteria. This is one reason why physicians have clinically administered small amounts of hydrogen peroxide (usually diluted in a standard saline solution) to patients as a healing agent for more than a hundred years.

I was surprised to learn that honey contains an enzyme that can actually help produce low yet continuous levels of hydrogen peroxide. This has been found to be a major reason for honeys legendary ability to kill bacteria, viruses, and fungi.

Buckwheat field. Photo by Hideo Sakata.

The use of honey as a healing agent is nothing new. It was an ingredient in medicinal compounds and cures made by Egyptian physicians five thousand years ago. In India ayurvedic physicians recommended using honey to promote good health, while the ancient Greeks believed that honey could promote both virility and longevity. Traditional Chinese healers started using honey thousands of years ago, and it continues to make up an important part of Chinese medicine today.

Although several hundred articles on the medicinal value of honey appeared in medical and scientific journals between 1935 and 1990, scientific research was often overlooked by physicians who focused on antibiotics, antivirals, and other drugs to treat human disease.

But with the rapidly increasing spread of superbugs like methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE), various strains of extended-spectrum beta-lactamases (ESBLs), and other microbes like Pseudomonas and coagulase-negative staphylococci that are becoming resistant to antibiotics, modern medicine has taken a second look at the healing properties of honey.

• Scientists have found that honey has a powerful inhibitory effect on no fewer than sixty species of bacteria. Many of these bacteria are notoriously resistant to antibiotics, but they are powerless against the antibacterial properties of honey.
• Laboratory and clinical research has found that in addition to treating wounds and skin infections, honey can be useful for treating burns as well as a wide variety of internal diseases, including upper respiratory infections, cough, and intestinal disorders. Honey may even help control diabetes, calm the nerves, and even promote more restful sleep.
• Honey is becoming a popular ingredient in government-approved therapeutic salves, ointments, lozenges, and wound dressings.
• Unlike antibiotics and other medications, honey is nontoxic and produces no adverse side effects. It is also inexpensive, easy to obtain, and can be used by virtually anyone.

Yet the story of the therapeutic value of honey is invariably connected with the amazing creature that produces it, the honeybee. Human beings have exploited honeybees since pre-Egyptian times. Honey hunting and beekeeping are among the oldest and most widespread of human activities. Yet the current methods of industrial agriculturewhere animals, plants, and the land that sustains them are treated as disposable commodities designed to return the greatest profit for the investmentpose a threat to the future well-being of bees, especially in North America, Europe, and other developed nations of the world.

While most of us think that bees are valued primarily as honey producers, their most important commercial value is that of pollinator. Honeybees pollinate most of the fruits and vegetables we eat: if it were not for their labor, these foods would never grow. The welfare of the honeybee and other insect pollinators is essential to our future well-being.