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 fair-minded when early man discovered the healing properties of honey, but evidence has been found to indicate that honey was used as an antibacterial plug in 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 element comes from Aristotle, who wrote that refulgent honey was a good liniment for sore eyes and wounds. A Greek physician, pharmacologist and naturalist 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 room book, De Materia Medica, which is a general to all fashionable 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 cavern ulcers ".
Honey was still being used to treat wounds up through World Warfare II, but with the progress of penicillin and other Twentieth Century antibiotic drugs, the natural antibacterial properties of honey have mainly been overlooked. Until recently.
Today we are inflowing augmented age of enlightenment. We are enjoying a rebirth of natural remedies and ingredients in response to the risks presented by paradoxical chemical ingredients in products that insert the food we eat, the containers we use to parcel our food, and most recently the cosmetics and skin care we recurrently slather on our proletariat.
Coupled with evidence that our super drugs and soaps are actually progression the risks to ourselves and our children by stimulating the natural upgrowth 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 genus of bacteria. It also exhibits an antifungal response on some yeasts and genus 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 bounteous benefit of creating a smoother surface between the cut and impudence. Since the gash is less likely to stick to the bandage, removing it is easier and less immense, and damage to the newly grown skin tissue is avoided. ”
“One recent review of 22 clinical catastrophe complete that honey typically shortened healing time on many types of wounds and provided people with better pain relief than antifungal creams or antibiotics ( International Chronicle of Lower Extremity Wounds, Stride 2006 ). In Bonn, Germany, researchers found that a product called Medihoney ( which is waiting for FDA trial run in the United States ) can heal some wounds faster than most antibiotics ( Convenient 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 potent antibacterial flak. 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 cut when played out as a sweetener. ) ”
The study Dr. Weil refers to included 22 disaster involving 2, 062 patients treated with honey, as well as an fresh 16 trouble that were performed on heuristic animals. Honey was found to be beneficial as a nick condiment in the following ways:
• Honey ' s antibacterial quality not only quickly clears existing infection, it protects wounds from additional infection
• Honey debrides wounds and removes malodor
• Honey ' s anti - inflammatory liveliness 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, thanks to 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 mortally 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 detail, 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 nullity like that ever been found anywhere else in the world. We know it has a very broad spectrum of vigor. It works on bacteria, fungi, protozoa. We sanctum ' t found body 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 facts by comparing the healing properties of other honeys with manuka honey. But he has given the unknown ingredient a name: separate manuka component, or UMF.
Dr. Molan says UMF manuka honey can even haft antibiotic - inflexible strains of bacteria. " Staphylococcus aureas is the most common nick - infecting sort of bacteria, and that ' s the most hypersensitive to honey that we ' ve found. And that includes the antibiotic withstanding strains - the MRSA - which is strict as hypersensitive to honey as any other staphylococcus aureas. "
According to the University of Waikato, there are four main components that get across the natural antibacterial activity of honey.
1. Osmotic upshot: The high sugar thrilled of honey means that there are very few water molecules available creation it difficult for micro - organisms to create. In precisely ripened honey, no yeast type are capable to grow and the growth of many sort of bacteria is totally inhibited.
2. Acidity: The pH of honey is characteristically totally low ( 3. 2 - 4. 5 ), which is low enough to inhibit many repelling pathogens and whence be a cogent antibacterial influence.
3. Hydrogen Peroxide: When bees are turning nectar to honey they bury a glucose oxidase enzyme. One of the by products of the serving big idea is hydrogen peroxide. When honey is diluted enzyme enterprise increases giving a ' still silence ' antiseptic at a level which is antibacterial but not tissue unsuccessful.
4. Phytochemical Factors: The elder factors cannot account for all of the antibacterial exertion empirical. There have been several chemicals with antibacterial bustle isolated in honey ( look Waikato Honey Research Unit ' s website for supplementary information ) by various researchers. This may render the high level of exertion pragmatic in Manuka honey.
The University’s Honey Research Unit adds “Honey has an antibacterial labor, due primarily to hydrogen peroxide formed in a " slow - release " fashion by the enzyme glucose oxidase already in honey, which can vary widely in potency. Some honeys are no more antibacterial than sugar, while others can be diluted more than 100 - canton and still halt the growth of bacteria. The difference in potency of antibacterial hustle found among the different honeys is more than 100 - community. ” Active Manuka honey has the highest antibacterial activity ever empitic 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 merchandise 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 chronology 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 produce – all based on Active manuka honey. Consumers can find Apicare products in stores throughout the country and Apicare hotelkeeper Pam Reade says, “If your store doesn’t move our products, conscientious request. They will soon. ”
Customers who are Internet savvy can purchase right away from the one website in the US that sells at the retail level immediately to mortals – Vashon Organics. Senior Partner at Vashon Organics, Desiree Nelson, says “The Apicare line is plainly incredible. We have never practical a product like this before – a personal care line that can repair your skin while it soothes and smoothes. ”