Herb

Garlic is used as both a culinary and medicinal herb. Numerous research studies have confirmed its anti-bacterial, anti-parasitic, anti blood-clotting, cholesterol-lowering, triglyceride-lowering and blood-pressure lowering effects.

Garlic contains a substance known as alliin. When garlic is chopped or crushed, alliin comes into contact with the enzyme allinase, to produce the odorous and medicinally active substance allicin. Allicin is unstable and is lost when garlic is cooked, distilled or chopped and left to stand for a few days. Without allicin, garlic loses its anti-microbial properties, although some experts believe that it may still retain some of its other effects. Others disagree. For instance according to renowned German herbalist Rudolph Fritz Weiss MD, if the smell is reduced, so is the medicinal action.

Some authorities have proposed that commercial garlic preparations should be measured in terms of their 'allicin-releasing potential'. Garlic products produced by heat or solvent extraction processes contain alliin but are devoid of allinase and therefore have no allicin-releasing potential. On the other hand dried garlic powder contains both alliin and allinase, therefore it does have allicin-releasing potential.

Allicin, the active principle, enters the bloodstream when ingested, soon reaching all parts of the body. Elimination is mainly via the lungs and skin, which is why the breath and sweat have the characteristic smell of garlic. As it pervades the lungs, garlic sterilizes the alveoli and bronchial tree of the lungs, so is helpful against bronchitic infections. It also has expectorant properties, and is sometimes added to cough medications.

Garlic has been used effectively to treat dysentery, typhoid, cholera, bacterial food poisoning, and worm infestations. Weiss describes it as particularly useful after amoebic dysentery when the bowels are still irritable, finding that it helps to heal the bowel with its significantly antibacterial, antispasmodic and antidyspeptic properties.

Some research has found that garlic improves the ability of the pancreas to produce insulin. Some components of garlic may also inhibit the growth of malignant (cancerous) cells. One of the most exciting recent studies in garlic research is that reported at a 1989 Aids conference. Ten HIV-positive patients with severely low natural killer cell activity, abnormal helper-to-suppressor T-cell ratios (both these parameters are indicators of advanced Aids, probably with short life expectancy) and opportunistic infections such as cryptosporidial diarrhoea were given 5 grams daily for six weeks and then 10 grams daily for six weeks of an aged garlic extract. Three patients died before the trial ended, but seven of the 10 experienced a return to normal natural killer cell activity by the end of the 12 weeks. Chronic diarrhoea and candidiasis also improved. (Int Conf AIDS [Canada] 5:466, 1989. ISBN 0-662-56670-X). Various trials have shown garlic to be effective against cryptococcus, cryptosporidia, herpes, mycobacteria and pneumocystis - all common infectious agents in Aids.

Kyolic garlic is garlic which has been subjected to a 'cold-ageing' process for 20 months. This process promotes the breakdown of alliin, the parent sulphur compound in garlic, into components which are odourless and chemically more stable. The therapeutic effects of kyolic garlic have mainly been researched (and found effective) in studies on the heart and circulation, and it is not known whether this form of garlic retains all the therapeutic properties of fresh garlic.

Suggested therapeutic intake: 1-3 cloves of fresh, raw garlic daily, chopped and swallowed with water, olive oil or lemon juice. Or garlic products as advised by a practitioner.