Most of us know honey as a natural sweetener that we can add to our beverages in place of granulated sugar or apply on bread rolls or toast as an alternative to jam or marmalade. Honey has been known to human civilization for over 8000 years and has been used as an important ingredient in medicines. In particular, Ayurveda the ancient Indian medicine system has used honey to treat a variety of human ailments. In recent times, laboratory tests carried out in various parts of the world have provided a scientific basis to what was previously dismissed as folklore.
How honey is made
Honey is made from nectar that male honeybees, also called drones, collect from flowers. The drone bee sucks the nectar into one of its two stomachs. Each bee can collect nectar equal to the bee’s own weight and a full load of nectar could mean visiting between 150 and 1000 flowers, depending on the type of flower. The drone bee returns to the beehive where the female worker bees ‘drink’ the nectar from the drone bees’ stomachs and predigest them into honey before depositing it into the beehive.
In commercial beekeeping, once the beehives are full of honey, the beekeeper builds a mild wood fire to smoke the bees away from the beehive. The filled beehives are replaced with empty beehives and the honey is extracted, processed and pasteurized to remove contaminants and then filled into containers.
The flavor, coloring and taste of the honey depend on the flowers from which the drone bee has extracted nectar. In commercial honey production, two or more sources of honey are often blended together to achieve a consistent texture and flavor for the end product.
Use of honey in medicine
While anecdotes and folklore talk of honey being used beneficially to cure a very wide range of diseases, a few are now broadly accepted and have been validated by clinical trials.
1. Quick energy boost
Honey is now recommended for a quick energy boost for athletes and for people involved in hard physical labor. In an extensive study conducted in 2001 at the University of Memphis, the efficacy of honey as a carbohydrate source for energizing tired muscles and providing a quick energy boost was established. The studies also showed that the use of honey reduced elevation of blood sugar and insulin levels compared to other forms of carbohydrates.
Honey has also been shown to reduce inflammation in muscles by a process not yet fully understood.
Following this study, validated in other sports medicine studies, honey is now recommended as an important part of the diet for athletes and others who need to do tiring physical work.
2. Healing cuts and open wounds
Honey has traditionally been applied to open wounds and cuts to help the healing process. In a study done at the University of Sydney in 2004, this property was scientifically validated. The study established that honey in contact with body fluids like blood and skin secretions produced a mild form of Hydrogen Peroxide which is a disinfectant.
This hydrogen peroxide kills bacteria without damaging skin cells. The wound heals faster and with less scarring than when the wound is treated with chemical disinfectants which damage skin cells.
Wounds treated with honey do not form the hard scabs seen with other forms of medication.
3. Use of honey for upper respiratory tract infection
The common cold, sore throat and cough, collectively labeled upper respiratory tract infection, accounts for some 40 percent of all medical consultation worldwide. Taking honey mixed in warm water, milk or tea has been a time honored home remedy. This has been validated by a study in the US that established that honey is more effective than dextromethorphan, the active ingredient in most over-the-counter cough remedies. Honey also does not have the side effect of causing drowsiness that could be a problem for people driving cars or operating machinery when using cough medication.
Honey also helps improve oral hygiene, in particular by destroying bacteria caused by food particles trapped between teeth and in people with gum disease. Improved oral hygiene also helps prevent a number of other ailments.
Adding honey to food appears to improve the digestive process by helping soothe the stomach lining that gets irritated by the stomach acids generated to digest oily and spicy food.
4. Use of honey in other medical applications
Research is continuing into the benefits of using honey for other medical applications. For example, the University of Bonn in Germany has established that the use of honey reduces inflammation of the skin and mucosa in cancer patients receiving radiotherapy. Treatment of peptic ulcers, caused by the bacteria Heliobacter Pyrolis has been done by administering tetracycline and the medication Pepto-Bismol. In prolonged treatment, the bacteria become immune to the antibiotic. Studies by the New Zealand Royal Society of Medicine show that honey helps kill the bacteria quite effectively with reduced distress to the patient.
Each such new finding is triggering work into finding further uses for honey in medicine. The caution for the lay person is not to start self medication with honey, but to consult a medical professional. The honey sold in grocery stores may not be entirely natural and may have contaminants.
Honey is also not advised for children under the age of one, due to the risk of a rare disease called infant botulism, a form of food poisoning.
The new research into the use of honey suggests that at least some of the folklore and ancient wisdom may have a sound basis. A clear parallel example is the labeling of acupuncture as a quack remedy until scientific experiments established that this was a beneficial form of treatment, often superior to surgery for ailments that cause chronic pain.
About the author: Margaret is a blogger by profession. She loves writing on environment and automotto. Beside this she is fond of books. She recently bought a moet champagne. These days she is busy in writing an article on maruti 800.
