Herbal meds don't seem to work

[epepke]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Herbal meds don't seem to work

Ew. Does that acutally do anything besides give them lead poisioning?

No.

 

[epepke]

I don't think we can seriously equate compounds extracted from herbs with the herbs themselves. The former can be purified and given in controlled doses, while the latter cannot always be relied upon for purity or consistent dosage. Aspirin, for example, may have been derived from plant sources, but that doesn't make the plant source safe and efficacious. Nobody would call aspirin an herbal remedy, although willow bark would qualify as one.

Emphasis mine.

And that's the point. Nobody calls a standard pharmaceutical product an "herbal medicine." Least of all herbalists. In fact, an herbalist will quite openly tell you that extracting the active ingredients just ruins an herbal medicine, which relies on a natural combination not present in any refined medicine.

In other words, by the definition of herbalists themselves, an herbal medicine cannot be refined without ruining it. By, again, herbalists' very own definitions, acetylsalicylic acid, digitalis, etc. are not part of herbal medicine. As herbalists have set themselves up as arbiters of herbal medicine, which seems quite natural, then I don't see any justifications to fight their definitions.

You might think I'm being picky, but these people will be very clear about, for example, the idea that ginseng derives its medicinal properties in Chinese medicine from the shape of the root. If someone discovered some useful chemical in ginseng, which might happen, then surely it would be ludicrous to say that this is because Chinese shape-based medicine works.

The fact that some plants have useful chemicals in them is great and wonderful for all sorts of uses, not only for medicine but because some of them taste really good and/or have industrial uses. But it has nothing to do with herbal medicine, as herbalists have chosen to step away from chemistry.