Honey: does it heal?

by Charles Downey

Honey: does it heal— Honey may have healing qualities.

A British teenager developed a blood infection so severe that both of his legs and some of his fingers had to be amputated.

During the next six months, he endured many painful skin grafts, developed terrible staphylococcal infections, and suffered horribly when his bandages were changed. The nurses tried everything to lessen his agony, including changing his dressings in the bath and giving him nitrous oxide for the pain. Nothing helped.

"It felt like they were ripping my skin off," he said.

When nothing else worked against the chronically infected sores, nurse Cheryl Dunford and her colleagues turned to Manuka honey from New Zealand. To start, they smeared sterilized Manuka on one set of dressings while the other leg was covered with a traditional dressing. Within a few days, the honey-dressed leg had a reduced bacterial count. The nurses then used the Manuka honey on the dressings of both legs. The teens lesions and wounds all healed within 10 weeks.

This case, reported in the April 6, 2000 issue of Nursing Times, was not the first to report that Manuka honey may be able to curb infection.

According to Peter Molan, professor of biochemistry at Waikato University in New Zealand, Manuka honey has remarkable antibacterial properties. Professor Molan has researched honey for two decades and heads up the universitys Honey Research Unit.

"Manuka honey is made by bees that swarm onto one type of bush found in New Zealand and Australia," says Professor Molan. "Because Manuka is so effective against terrible infections, were sure this honey contains an as-yet-unidentified antimicrobial agent."

Commercially known as MediHoney, the sweet stuff has been approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration in Australia and by Medsafe in New Zealand (those countries equivalents of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration).

While Manuka honey seems to be more powerful than other types of honey, ancient peoples would only yawn if you told them honey is being used in medicine.

According to John Riddle, professor of ancient science at North Carolina State University, a medical text written on papyrus from 3000 years B.C. specifies the use of honey for head wounds. He says that perhaps "the honey helped prevent swelling and sealed off the wound to keep air and infection out."

Hippocrates, the Greek physician, also praised honeys healing powers and came up with many honey-based treatments for ailments such as skin disorders, ulcers and sores. In World War I, German physicians used a mixture of honey and cod liver oil to treat gunshot wounds. But with the advent of modern antibiotics in World War II, honey fell from favor among physicians.

Ordinary honey ties up water so that bacteria in a wound have insufficient water to multiply. The water activity of honey inhibits bacterial growth, and the pH of honey is between 3.2 and 4.5—low enough to inhibit the growth of many common bacteria.The major antibacterial activity in honey, however, is thought to be due to hydrogen peroxide (much like the commercial product you purchase at the pharmacy), which is produced enzymatically. The level of hydrogen peroxide produced is antibacterial, but doesnt damage the tissues.

In one Indian study of patients with burns, physicians compared ordinary honey with silver sulfadiazine—the standard treatment—and found it to be just as effective. In the study, 104 patients with partial-thickness burns were randomly assigned to receive one of the two treatments. Half the patients were treated with 15-30 mL honey spread on their wounds each day and then their burns were covered with dry sterile gauze.The other half of the patients received the standard treatment of gauze soaked with silver sulfadiazine, and the gauze was replaced daily.Among patients treated with honey, healthy tissue granulation appeared, on average, at 7.4 days, compared with 13.4 days for patients given the standard treatment. Wounds healed more rapidly in the honey group (33 of 52 patients within 10 days and all patients within 40 days) compared with other group (35 of 52 patients within 30 days and all patients within 60 days).Only four honey-treated patients showed infection at the burn site after seven days of treatment, compared with 38 of the patients given the standard treatment.

At the University of Connecticut Health Center in Farmington, immunologist T.V. Rajan, MD, PhD, is studying the healing powers of simple honey to treat seasonal allergies. The study is based on the theory of oral tolerance, which reasons that humans become accustomed to things they ingest. So, if people eat local pollens—via pollen-rich honey—allergic reactions to pollen in the spring and summer should diminish. Study subjects receive either a tablespoon of local honey, non-local honey as a placebo, or their usual allergy medications. So far, Dr. Rajan is encouraged by the findings, although his results wont be released until 2001.

Researchers at the University of Illinois reported in the Journal ofAgricultural Research in 1998 that antioxidants in 14 various honeys were highest in the darkest honeys (Manuka honey is very dark). Antioxidants in the diet are important because they slow the production of free radicals that cause DNA damage and have been implicated in age-related illnesses, such as arthritis, stroke and cancer.

"Honey also has a lot to offer as a replacement for table sugar," says May Berenbaum, PhD, head of the entomology department and a researcher at the University of Illinois Functional Foods for Health program.

At the University of Memphis Exercise and Sport Nutrition Lab, Richard Kreider, PhD, did research that may sweeten the appeal of honey to athletes. "During the past three decades, athletes have used carbohydrate-loaded sports gels for quick energy," says Dr. Kreider. "But many [of those products] cause [a] quick rise and fall in blood sugar."

While studying the blood glucose and insulin concentration in 71 subjects, Dr. Kreider gave the athletes one of seven substances, including table sugar, dextrose, fruit sugar, placebos and honey. Honey provided the quickest boost of energy for a longer endurance—without a big drop in blood sugar later.

Will honey cure your allergies? Can you apply it on minor scrapes and burns rather than using antibacterial ointment? While existing research is intriguing, more information from research studies is needed to confirm the therapeutic uses of honey. So ask your health care practitioner about using honey for minor infections and allergies.

One word of caution: Because honey contains spores that can cause botulism infection in infants, it should never be fed to children younger than one year old.