Are All Prescribed Drugs Safe?
Nothing we ingest is truly safe, whether it is a simple food or some wild mushroom in the remotest forest. True, some prescription drugs administered for the purpose of relieving an ailment, are as medicine, been proven to be safe because they have been used for many decades without any known adverse effect. Nonetheless, we do know that there have been prescription drug medications which have been proven unsafe for human consumption, because there were adverse effects from their use, the names of which will not be mentioned.
Foods That Have Been Used For Centuries To Prevent Disease Or Illness
We know these to be safe:
Garlic
One food that is at the top of the list for saving lives for as long as history can remember is the "poor man's Penicillin", better known as Garlic. The Russians used tons of this magical herb during WWII to prevent disease. It has been said by some medical researchers that "it is a greater bacteria fighter than Penicillin".
Cloves
Clove extract neutralizes asbestos fibers.
Many people have used whole cloves to relieve tooth pain from minor abscess of a tooth, but there is a more beneficial use for this age-old pain reliever.
It has been recently discovered that cloves, especially in powdered form will kill harmful bacteria like E: coli. Add a pinch to your hamburger or bun.
Cinnamon
For many years a prime ingredient in apple pie as a mild and distinctive aromatic spice, has been found by some researchers trying to find a natural food that would control blood sugar in diabetics and lo and behold they fed their test patients Apple pie and by accident, they found that the patients that ate the apple pie had a big drop in their blood sugar levels.
The experiment: newscientist.com
Molecular Mimic
The active ingredient in cinnamon turned out to be a water-soluble polyphenol compound called MHCP. In test tube experiments, MHCP mimics insulin, activates its receptor, and works synergistically with insulin in cells.
To see if it would work in people, Alam Khan, who was a postdoctoral fellow in Anderson's lab, organized a study in Pakistan. Volunteers with Type 2 diabetes were given one, three or six grams of cinnamon powder a day, in capsules after meals.
All responded within weeks, with blood sugar levels that were on average 20 per cent lower than a control group. Some even achieved normal blood sugar levels. Tellingly, blood sugar started creeping up again after the diabetics stopped taking cinnamon.
The cinnamon has additional benefits. In the volunteers, it lowered blood levels of fats and "bad" cholesterol, which are also partly controlled by insulin. And in test tube experiments it neutralized free radicals, damaging chemicals, which are elevated in diabetics.
Buns and Pies
"I don't recommend eating more cinnamon buns, or even more apple pie - there's too much fat and sugar," says Anderson. "The key is to add cinnamon to what you would eat normally."
The active ingredient is not in cinnamon oils. But powdered spice can be added to toast, cereal, juice or coffee. Just add some to your coffee perc.
