Before the advent of allopathic medicine, herbs were used to treat infections caused by bacteria. Now that antibiotics are used to treat infections, many bacteria have become resistant to antibiotics. Because of this, medical researchers have been exploring plants that can treat anti-biotic resistant diseases.
World Health Organization Endorses Traditional Medicine
The spurt of researches on botanical medicine was partly encouraged by the resolution passed by the World Health Organization (WHO) in May 1978. This resolution encouraged nations to explore traditional forms of healing and medicine in order to meet the increasing needs of the world’s increasing population.
The researches that resulted from the WHO resolution revealed that many herbs have strong antibacterial qualities, often equal to or surpassing the power of antibiotics.
Bacteria are life forms and like all life forms they have the drive to survive and reproduce. They adapt to threats to their survival. Some bacteria are naturally resistant to antibiotics, but all bacteria respond remarkably well and fast to changes in the environment.
As Dr. Jeffrey Fisher, who is an immunologist, explained: “Bacteria don’t do this instantly, but rather through evolutionary trial and error. Once the right biochemical combination to resist the antibiotic in question develops, the new mutated strain will flourish – a pure example of Darwinian survival of the fittest… Unlike humans who produce a new generation every twenty years or so, bacteria produce a new generation every twenty minutes, multiplying 500,000 times faster than we do.”
Creation of Superbugs
The New York Times has coined the phrase “bacterial superbugs,” referring to those bacteria that are naturally immune and those mutating to survive antibiotics. These superbugs seem to be getting stronger and the diseases they cause are becoming more severe and result in higher mortality than those that they produced in the earlier years.
Bacteria are literally engineering responses to antibiotics and they are also passing these on to their offspring. Aside from these, they also do something else that makes them amazingly dangerous – they communicate with each other. It took scientists a long time to discover this, but it is now known that these single-cell organisms are very smart.
Bacteria contain special loops in their DNA which are called plasmids. When two bacteria meet, even if they are not of the same kind, they position themselves alongside each other and exchange information. They possess a kind of biological internet and exchange information with great frequency. And among the information they exchange is how to be resistant to antibiotics.
When a resistant bacterium meets a non-resistant bacterium, the resistant bacterium extends a filament called a plasmid. The non-resistant bacterium allows the plasmid in through a small “door” on its cell wall. Inside the filament is a copy of a portion of the resistant bacterium’s DNA which also contains the encoded information on resistance to one or more antibiotics. This information becomes part of the non-resistant bacterium’s make-up and it then becomes antibiotics resistant too. The communicated resistance could be in the form of natural immunity, information on how to disable or destroy one or more antibiotics, or it could have information on how to prevent the antibiotic from having an effect. Indeed, the bacteria now know how best to fight the weapons humans have created to destroy them. Newsweek magazine quoted Dr. Richard Wenzel of the University of Iowa, “They’re so much older than we are… and wiser.”
And it doesn’t end here. Bacteria that have the ability to resist antibiotics can emit unique pheromones that attract other bacteria to them for the purpose of exchanging resistant information. Bacteria also have “jumping genes” or transpoons, which have the ability to teach antibiotic resistance. They can jump from bacterium to bacterium without reliance on plasmid exchange. As if that were not enough, bacteria release free-roving pieces of their DNA that carry resistance information. When other bacteria encounter these roving bits of information, they ingest it and learn how to overcome antibiotics. And aside from all these, bacteria learn how to survive multiple antibiotics after an encounter with one antibiotic.
Herbal Antibiotics
Botanical medicines offer some hope in the fight against bacteria. Research has shown that plants have a much more complex chemistry than antibiotics. Pharmaceuticals are usually made from one chemical constituent, therefore, penicillin is penicillin and tetracycline is tetracycline. This is why bacteria can easily figure out how to survive them. Herbs, on the other hand, have complex chemistries. Garlic contains at least 33 sulfur compounds, 17 amino acids and a dozen other compounds. Yarrow contains over 120 different compounds and so when a person takes yarrow as herbal medicine, the body ingests 120 different medicines that are in a powerful synergy with each other and enhance the effects in the body. Thus, the invading bacteria have a more difficult time in developing resistance. The pharmaceutical industry is now mimicking this complex makeup of botanical medicines by combining several antibiotics in one pill.
Among the many herbs that are effective for antibacterial diseases are acacia, aloe, cryptolepsis, echinacea, eucalyptus, garlic, ginger, goldenseal, grapefruit seed extract, honey, juniper, licorice, sage, usnea and wormwood.
Source:Buhner, Stephen Harrod. Herbal Antibiotics, Natural Alternatives for Treating Drug Resistant Bacteria, Storey Publishing, 1999
