Do bacteria and viruses get resistant to herbs the way they do to drugs?
There is no known bacterial, viral, or fungal “resistance” to complex herbal formulas. Some of these formulas have been used for thousands of years with no evidence of waning efficacy. The Chinese medicine text, the “Nei Ching” is estimated to have been drafted in 200 a.d., and contains formulas that are still used effectively for infections today. The “resistance to resistance” of Chinese and other herbal formulas, is thought to occur because there are several herbs in each formula, and each herb has many complex plant alkaloids. This complexity is believed to be too much for the “bugs” to process; it is much easier for them to adapt and “outwit” the simpler “one item” pharmaceuticals. According to certain health experts in America and abroad, traditional herbal medicines may soon be our only weapon against bacteria, like staphylococcus–“staph”–that are fast becoming resistant to antibiotics! Please refer to Wall Street Journal Article 5/8/03: “New Respect for Chinese Herbal Medicin
