The Amazing Health Properties of Manuka Honey

(imzaia.com) 'Manuka Honey is another of Mother Earth's wonderful gifts to effectively kill just about every pathogen on the planet. Today the pharmaceutical industry has come heavily under fire - and rightfully so - and they finally have to admit that antibiotics for example cannot be changed and adapted quickly enough in order to still be effective against the ever (artificially) mutating strands of bacteria and viruses. As more and more people develop allergies for antibiotics and as antibiotics themselves are becoming absolutely ineffective, we need to find new ways and go back to basics.

Gaia has always provided us with everything we need and finally many humans are realizing that synthesizing natural drugs doesn't do the trick in the long run. Not only are the side effects of chemical drugs often such that more drugs need to be taken in order to neutralize those side effects adding even more stress to the recovering body, but also they are mostly designed in such a way that a majority of people need to keep taking some sort of chemical drug until they exit this reality.

This is not the case with natural remedies. Nature's health cures don't have adverse side effects and they are not addictive. 'Alternative' health cures have long been used all over the world, but after having lost quite some territory for a number of years to the pharmaceutical industry especially in the west, with growing ineffectiveness or even adverse results of chemical drugs and the frenzy of modern day life, many people start to remember their roots and reconnect with Gaia. It is a logical step therefore, for people to turn away from synthesized drugs and return to the safety of Mother Natures medicine.'

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Honey, I killed the superbug

AUSTRALIAN researchers have been astonished to discover a cure-all right under their noses -- a honey sold in health food shops as a natural medicine.

Far from being an obscure health food with dubious healing qualities, new research has shown the honey kills every type of bacteria scientists have thrown at it, including the antibiotic-resistant "superbugs" plaguing hospitals and killing patients around the world.

Some bacteria have become resistant to every commonly prescribed antibacterial drug. But scientists found that Manuka honey, as it is known in New Zealand, or jelly bush honey, as it is known in Australia, killed every bacteria or pathogen it was tested on.

It is applied externally and acts on skin infections, bites and cuts.

The honey is distinctive in that it comes only from bees feeding off tea trees native to Australia and New Zealand, said Dee Carter, from the University of Sydney's School of Molecular and Microbial Biosciences.

The findings are likely to have a major impact on modern medicine and could lead to a range of honey-based products to replace antibiotic and antiseptic creams.

Professor Carter's two sons, Marty, 8 and Nicky, 6, think it's funny the way their mother puts honey on their sores. But she swears by it, telling stories of how quickly it cures any infection.

"Honey sounds very homey and unscientific, which is why we needed the science to validate the claims made for it," she said.

The curative properties of various types of honey have been known to indigenous cultures for thousands of years, and dressing wounds with honey was common before the advent of antibiotics.

"Most bacteria that cause infections in hospitals are resistant to at least one antibiotic, and there is an urgent need for new ways to treat and control surface infections," Professor Carter said.

"New antibiotics tend to have short shelf lives, as the bacteria they attack quickly become resistant. Many large pharmaceutical companies have abandoned antibiotic production because of the difficulty of recovering costs. Developing effective alternatives could therefore save many lives."

Professor Carter said the fascinating thing was that none of the bacteria researchers used to test the honey, including superbugs such as flesh-eating bacteria, built up any immunity.

She said a compound in the honey called methylglyoxal -- toxic on its own -- combined in unknown ways with other unidentified compounds in the honey to cause "multi-system failure" in the bacteria.

The results of the research project are published in this month's European Journal of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases.

Source: www.theaustralian.com.au

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Healing Wounds and other Health Conditions with Manuka Honey

Honey has been used for thousands of years to treat wounds, gastroenteritis and infections. Unfortunately, it was displaced from common usage by the advent of antibiotics in the 1940s. However, now that the widespread and rapidly increasing resistance of microbes to antibiotics has become a major global threat to health, there has been a renewed interest in the use of honey to treat infections.

It has been discovered that some honeys are better than others for treating infections. It was through scientific investigation that Manuka honey (from New Zealand) was discovered to have a unique antimicrobial component in addition to the enzymically produced hydrogen peroxide that is responsible for the antimicrobial activity of all honey. It has also been discovered that the unique antimicrobial activity of Manuka Honey is so powerful that it is effective against antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria. Unlike other topical antimicrobial agents used on wounds, Manuka honey does not slow the healing process by having adverse effects on the exposed wound tissue. This is considered to be a major advantage to using Manuka Honey for wound care. Clinical experience shows that active Manuka honey with high levels of this unique antibacterial activity gives rapid clearance of infection from heavily infected wounds that are not responding to other treatments, and gives rapid healing of chronic wounds.

There is also evidence showing that Manuka honey protects burns from becoming infected. Manuka Honey is now used prophylacticly on hospital patients that are at risk of acquiring infection through antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Manuka honey has a potent antibacterial action against MRSA, VRE, ESBL strains of various species, Acinetobacter baumannii, Stenotrophomonas maltophilia and other species such as Pseudomonads and coagulase-negative Staphylococci that are difficult to control because of antibiotic resistance. The most common routes of infection for these bacteria, leading to fatal septicaemia in patients with a weakened immune system, are open wounds and where catheters are inserted into the body. Studies suggest the effectiveness of Manuka honey in preventing infection of catheter exit sites have given positive results.

In addition to rapidly clearing infection, Manuka honey has been demonstrated in clinical usage to have several other therapeutic actions that are of great benefit. It very rapidly causes pus and dead tissue to lift off messy wounds, so surgical debridement or the use of enzymes (which are generally too expensive to use) are not necessary to get a clean wound bed to allow healing to begin. It actively stimulates the healing process, so that rapid healing occurs and skin grafting is not necessary. It soothes inflammation and therefore decreases the exudation of serum from wounds, and decreases swelling and pain.

Manuka honey's anti-inflammatory action also hastens the healing process of wounds without the formation of a scar. This is because part of the inflammatory process is the stimulation of fibroblasts to produce scar tissue to repair the wound, and prolonged inflammation gives over-stimulation, so excessive amounts of scar tissue are produced.

One of the factors that has slowed the usage of Manuka honey in clinical practice has been the practical difficulty of handling a very sticky substance that, when it warms up to body temperature, becomes watery and runs off wounds. However, there are now products containing Manuka honey that are easy to apply to wounds. These are not only convenient to use but also increase the effectiveness of the Manuka honey on the wound. Because the water content of honey is strongly bound up with the sugar molecules, there is very little wetting of dressings applied to cover honey on a wound. Skin care products containing Manuka honey are showing good results when used on wounds, burns and dermatitis where the combination of the antibacterial activity with the moisturizing effect of Manuka honey on skin is beneficial.

Another use for Manuka honey is for the treatment of gastritis and peptic ulcers. Laboratory research has shown that the anti-inflammatory properties of Manuka honey are involved in its action, but its antibacterial action is also a factor, as the bacterium, Helicobacter pylori, is a major cause of gastritis and peptic ulcers. Laboratory testing of H. pylori has shown that its growth is halted by Manuka honey at concentrations as low as 5%, but not by any other type of honey. Manuka honey gives significant relief of stomach pain, whereas other types of honey do not. It has also been reported that Manuka honey reduces the duration of bacterial diarrhoea.


Source: http://manuka-honey.blogspot.com

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The Miraculous Manuka Honey

Unique Manuka Factor or commonly known as UMF is the only worldwide standard in identifying and measuring the antibacterial strength or quality of some strains of Manuka. It is a guarantee that the honey being sold has the special UMF antibacterial property and a UMF rating of 10 is the minimum recognised. Ordinary manuka has only the hydrogen peroxide antibacterial property which is common to most types of honey, whereas UMF Manuka has both the natural hydrogen peroxide antibacterial property and its own natural UMFantibacterial property, giving it increased antibacterial potency. The UMF property is very stable, unlike the hydrogen peroxide antibacterial property common in most honey which is easily destroyed by heat, light as well as certain enzymes in body serum.

UMF Manuka, also known as "Medihoney" in some pharmacies, is the preferred honey for wound dressing and other special therapeutic uses and studies are showing Manuka with high levels of UMF could be very effective in helping relieve stomach ulcer symptoms and gastritis, and sore throats, and when applied topically, in assisting the natural cure of skin ulcers, wounds, burns, boils, cracked skin. That is also why many skincare products also contain UMF manuka as a special ingredient and promise positive benefits from their regular application on the skin. Another reason why Manuka honey, which is available in most Kiwi homes, is favoured by so many honey fans is that it has a higher than normal conductivity, which is an indirect measurement of mineral content of a honey - about 4 times that of normal flower honeys. UMF is not found in the nectar of all Manuka flowers, which are known as Leptospermum scoparium and belong to the the Tea Tree bushes found in New Zealand's coastal areas. (To be more accurate here, Manuka is also found in Tasmania, but it has been so successfully marketed and branded by New Zealand producers that most people see it an exclusively Kiwi product.) Some Manuka bushes do not produce honey with the UMF property every year, and the concentrations of UMF can vary from batch to batch and year to year. The reason why only some Manuka honeys have the unique UMF antibacterial property is not yet known. Researchers believe that it could be from a subspecies of Manuka or due to some environmental factor such as soil type.

There are varying UMF strengths - UMF 10, UMF 15, UMF 20, UMF 25, and the higher the UMF, the more expensive is the honey. Manuka honey labelled with a registered trademark UMF® by licensed companies are packed into jars with ratings of UMF 10 or more. In the market, you can now find other established certified measurements and trademarks of this extraordinary antibacterial property with the same medicinal benefits as UMF. They are the NPA Label, Non Peroxide Activity and MGO, the Methylglyoxal rating. A bottle of Manuka with an NPA 15+ is comparable to UMF 15+, NPA 20+ is comparable to UMF 20+, and so on, whereas Manuka MGO 200+ is the equivalent of UMF 10+ and MGO 400+ is the equivalent of UMF 20+.

The taste of Manuka is probably an acquired one; the more I eat it, the more I can appreciate its remarkable depth and the unique unforgetable foresty aroma that stands out amongst the honey varieties. I often find myself mixing a tablespoon of the honey with warm water or tea whenever I have a sore throat, cough, cold or flu symptoms, or when I experience "heatiness" in my body. My family has benefited much from taking Manuka honey (my older daughter especially loves the taste). I love everything about it except its price. I am not sure how easy it is for you to find this honey, but a bottle of Manuka honey with UMF here in Singapore is really expensive - about 10 times or more the price of regular honey! And a pack of 20 Manuka honey and propolis drops/lozenges from New Zealand for soothing the throat costs about 9 Sing dollars (about 6 US dollars).

Warning: According to Dr. Ron Fessenden of The Honey Revolution, daily consumption of Manuka honey is not recommended for those who are diabetic or prediabetic due to its high level of methylglyoxal which could induce complications of diabetes.

Source: http://www.benefits-of-honey.com

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Active Manuka Honey

New Zealand's active manuka honey is used as a natural product both internally and topically on the skin. Apitherapy, the name given to treatment with natural honey, has been used by many different cultures throughout history. Such uses are now being reconsidered by a modern world in light of new research into the properties and uses of active manuka honey.

What is known as 'Active' Manuka Honey has enjoyed growing acceptance by the academic and medical world in recent years, and reporting of the honey's unique properties has proliferated in the world's press and media.

Manuka honey comes from New Zealand where beekeepers set up their hives in wild uncultivted areas in which Manuka bushes grow. The bees gather nectar from the flowers of the Manuka bush, which is indigenous only to New Zealand. The honey making process is enriched by the pollution free environment of New Zealand, and certain harvests of Manuka Honey have attracted the gaze of the medicial and scientific community. Some of the Manuka Honey produced has been found to have some very special properties indeed.

It is only thanks to academic research, predominantly in the last decade, that we are now able to explain many of the incredible observed effects that certain specially selected and tested honeys can have.

It is not as yet fully understood why only some Manuka honey has an antimicrobial property not shared by other honeys. This property is called the Unique Manuka Factor(UMF®) antibacterial property.

The presence of this activity can be detected by laboratory testing, which is conducted by the Honey Research Unit at the University of Waikato in New Zealand. Honey that is tested and verified to have a level of 10 or more is given a UMF rating and is referred to as 'Active'.


Source: www.manukahoney.co.uk

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(imzaia.com) 'It is very encouraging to know that science has taken a renewed interest in researching the  antibiotic and healing properties of Manuka honey. With ever more diseases being introduced, this gift of nature is providing us with a much needed cure for many physical imbalances.

We at Imzaia have chosen to step away from foods with chemical additives, flouridated water and chemical drugs. For obvious reasons we use many natural remedies to keep our bodies in the best possible shape. Manuka honey provides us with a most welcome addition to our 'medicine cabinet' of virgin coconut oil, chlorella, maca, turneric, hemp oil and more.

Our deepest gratitude for Gaia's miracle cures!'