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Why is there less talk about medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms in west today


nec209

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Why so many people in west view medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms less these days than in the past or other countries?

It seems today medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms are viewed has snake oil medicine or mixed results today.

And medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms are viewed less science than say chiropractic in the west where chiropractic is more popular there.

 

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3 minutes ago, nec209 said:

Why so many people in west view medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms less these days than in the past or other countries?

Which other countries?

As for the US and Canada:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5593261/

https://www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/complementary-and-alternative-medicine-use-and-public-attitudes-1997-2006-and-2016

 

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39 minutes ago, nec209 said:

Why so many people in west view medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms less these days than in the past or other countries?

Because too many people were claiming they did things which they obviously did not. Too many people simply invented narratives about how these voodoo medicines functioned. 

Some of us prefer things which work and which aren’t based on little more than half truths from uncle Larry and old wives tales from granny’s weird cousin. 

Do you know what they call alternative medicine that actually works? They call it “medicine.”

Edited by iNow
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They are viewed less scientifically because they haven't, thus far, passed scientific scrutiny for claimed treatments. That's why it's seen as snake oil. 

23 minutes ago, iNow said:

Do you know what they call alternative medicine that actually works? They call it “medicine.”

Absolutely. I've had a lot of experience in the past with cannabis, "herb"' is a common euphemism, and I think I understand it quite well, and where it might be useful for things like stress management, but the claims made for thc, cbd and other derivatives just makes my eyes roll. It seems to  me these people are trying to justify their recreational use by referring to medical research for particular applications  as a justification for using it recreationally; if they are honest with themselves. I just wanted to get out of my head to block the world out and feel different... escapism, basically. It was symptomatic of a problem I had, rather than a solution.

Edited by StringJunky
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People lie about everything. Big Pharma also lies about its products, their efficacy and their side effects; a lot of mainstream drug advertising is bogus.

That doesn't mean everything said about anything is a lie.

Medicine began with herbs and poultices, and none of those native properties of plants have gone away. Linden and elderflower tea is still a safer soporific than nambutoal or bourbon; a salt-water gargle, followed by warm honey and lemon is still better for a sore throat than Robitussin (if only by price). People keep using old, simple home remedies because they're readily accessible and they work. 

OTOH, if an 'alternative' treatment is as or more expensive than the mainstream version, it's probably a scam.      

Edited by Peterkin
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Any benefit provided is in most cases just placebo 

45 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

might be useful for things like stress management

Herb and it’s related gummy offshoots is often helpful for pain, not just the emotional variety either. 

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31 minutes ago, iNow said:

Any benefit provided is in most cases just placebo 

Herb and it’s related gummy offshoots is often helpful for pain, not just the emotional variety either. 

I guess it depends how strong the herbs or smoking pot acts as pain killer. People know heroin or morphine by injection is going to be the strongest like some one that got shot than minor pain.

But if I remember there was some herbal medicine used to treat infections.

Not sure about cancer because most people in the past did not live long enough to get cancer. So cancer and heart disease is more problem today.

37 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

People lie about everything. Big Pharma also lies about its products, their efficacy and their side effects; a lot of mainstream drug advertising is bogus.

That doesn't mean everything said about anything is a lie.

Medicine began with herbs and poultices, and none of those native properties of plants have gone away. Linden and elderflower tea is still a safer soporific than nambutoal or bourbon; a salt-water gargle, followed by warm honey and lemon is still better for a sore throat than Robitussin (if only by price). People keep using old, simple home remedies because they're readily accessible and they work. 

OTOH, if an 'alternative' treatment is as or more expensive than the mainstream version, it's probably a scam.      

Why have there not been controlled blind studies and this would rule out evil Big Pharma or evil person selling the herbs?

Edited by nec209
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48 minutes ago, iNow said:

Any benefit provided is in most cases just placebo 

Herb and it’s related gummy offshoots is often helpful for pain, not just the emotional variety either. 

Placebo is a potent effect. I have pretended a yellow Smartie;/M&M will kill my headache, and it does. Headache tablets work in a few minutes. I've had a nagging toothache  for days, then I walk into a dentist and it subsides. Powerful stuff, the mind. 

Edited by StringJunky
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Compared to when? Before this pandemic began?

 

Anti-vax talk and nature-worshipping talk have long been joined at the hip, and the former took on a much darker tone when it so plainly and so unmistakably got so many people killed in recent times. Sure, vaccines saved lives before, but a disease where so many city-dwellers could witness people dying on the street en masse right in front of them is a little harder to explain away than some historical plague that one could, consciously or subconsciously, think of as hoaxes. While anti-vax sentiment has been alarmingly stubborn in the face of this pandemic (and right-wingers shifting the goalposts from blaming leftism for anti-vaxxers to co-opting anti-vaxxers themselves has been especially odd), at the very least it's left less room for sitting on the fence.

 

In theory "herbal medicines" with fewer side-effects are less harmful in and of themselves than anti-vax rhetoric, but in practice legitimizing this kind of nature-worshipping talk has paved the way for legitimizing it in higher stakes contexts like how to deal with pandemics.

 

If not from before this pandemic began, then what chronological reference point are you referring to?

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1 hour ago, nec209 said:

Why have there not been controlled blind studies

There have been. Some things work; some things don't. It's not whole-hog, all-or-nothing situation. Most mainstream medications do what they're supposed to, and have the side-effects that they're legally forced to declare. Most herbal remedies work as they're supposed to, within limits.  

1 hour ago, nec209 said:

and this would rule out evil Big Pharma or evil person selling the herbs

Rule out of what? It's not a question of evil persons. Everybody who sells remedies wants to make people better and wants to make a living - though not necessarily in that order in every instance. The marketplace operates by its own rules. 

1 hour ago, nec209 said:

People know heroin or morphine by injection is going to be the strongest like some one that got shot than minor pain.

The poppy is a powerful plant. Has been for about 4000 years, in one form or another. Modern medicine comes out of older medicine which comes out of primitive medicine. These are not disciplines different in kind; they are the branches of the same discipline.

Never mind the hype and rhetoric, just follow the chemistry.

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3 hours ago, StringJunky said:

They are viewed less scientifically because they haven't, thus far, passed scientific scrutiny for claimed treatments. That's why it's seen as snake oil. 

Absolutely. I've had a lot of experience in the past with cannabis, "herb"' is a common euphemism, and I think I understand it quite well, and where it might be useful for things like stress management, but the claims made for thc, cbd and other derivatives just makes my eyes roll. It seems to  me these people are trying to justify their recreational use by referring to medical research for particular applications  as a justification for using it recreationally; if they are honest with themselves. I just wanted to get out of my head to block the world out and feel different... escapism, basically. It was symptomatic of a problem I had, rather than a solution.

Yea I find it strange cannabis and chiropractic are view more as science and more popular than say herbal medicine or chinese medicine.

Now crystal healing is very quackery. There is no medium or any thing in crystals as it is just crystal and nothing coming out of the crystal it is just shape. 

Well herbal medicine in west started fall when the pharmaceutical companies started.

 

26 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

 

The poppy is a powerful plant. Has been for about 4000 years, in one form or another. Modern medicine comes out of older medicine which comes out of primitive medicine. These are not disciplines different in kind; they are the branches of the same discipline.

Not sure what you mean here. If you mean chemicals when you eat food, take herb, take green tea, smoke a plant or take pill well in your body it is chemical.  As your body works by that system.  The body works on chemical system so than every is broken down on chemical level.

If you mean herbal medicine ran out of nature stuff of say plants, oils, tress, leafs, flowers or what ever with chemical properties that work and need to come up with new chemicals not found in nature and so the pharmaceutical companies have to make their own chemicals.

 

Edited by nec209
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17 minutes ago, nec209 said:

Yea I find it strange cannabis and chiropractic are view more as science and more popular than say herbal medicine or chinese medicine.

Now crystal healing is very quackery. There is no medium or any thing in crystals as it is just crystal and nothing coming out of the crystal it is just shape. 

Well herbal medicine in west started fall when the pharmaceutical companies started.

 

I think a fair few synthesised drugs are just analogues of material found in nature. Aspirin is salicylic acid with an acetyl group attached. Salicylic acid, from willow bark, was the original drug used for headaches etc, then chemists found out how to copy it and make it more refined with a predictable dosage. With raw materials you don't know how much of the active ingredient you are taking or impurities that may be harmful.

Edited by StringJunky
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18 minutes ago, nec209 said:

Yea I find it strange cannabis and chiropractic are view more as science and more popular than say herbal medicine or chinese medicine.

Cannabis has been widely tested by mainstream medicine and found efficacious (with fewer drawbacks and side effects than the available alternatives) for some uses.

I don't know much about chiropractic, except that many patients appear to benefit. What is the alternative to that? 

Herbal medicine never went anywhere: in some periods it is more popular, in others, it's less.

Chinese medicine is a whole lot of different practices - some good, some bad, some mumbo.

If you lump a bunch of different things together, all you will get is confusion. Cite one specific remedy, trace its origins and compare how it's applied in different cultures, and by whom. then you might get an overview of the evolutionary pathways of pharmaceuticals and threrapies. 

18 minutes ago, nec209 said:

Well herbal medicine in west started fall when the pharmaceutical companies started.

Tell us how that happened.

Edited by Peterkin
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18 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Tell us how that happened.

I think part of the story is that there’s no patent protection for existing treatments, unless you can isolate some unique compound. So no incentive to go through the expense of clinical trials. You can sell it as a supplement but it’s a bit like selling a generic after patents expire.

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3 hours ago, nec209 said:

I guess it depends how strong the herbs or smoking pot acts as pain killer. People know heroin or morphine by injection is going to be the strongest like some one that got shot than minor pain.

But if I remember there was some herbal medicine used to treat infections.

Not sure about cancer because most people in the past did not live long enough to get cancer. So cancer and heart disease is more problem today.

Why have there not been controlled blind studies and this would rule out evil Big Pharma or evil person selling the herbs?

As a matter of fact, study of natural products has always been, and continues to be, very important in pharmaceutical research. Here is an article reviewing the topic:

https://academic.oup.com/jimb/article/43/2-3/249/5995725?login=false

An example from personal experience is the chemotherapy drug Taxol, which my late wife took for ovarian cancer (It did a good job but made her hair fall out). This was isolated from the Pacific yew tree  and was found at the time of its discovery to be one of the most effective of some 12,000 natural compounds being studied for therapeutic use.: https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_1/taxus/brevifolia.htm

What modern medicine does not do, however, is adopt traditional plant remedies without first isolating the active ingredient, understanding its mode of action and trialling in a controlled way to check its efficacy, safety and the optimum dose to use. By the time all that is done and the active ingredient is available as a drug, you may no longer realise it is in fact a natural remedy.   

Edited by exchemist
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22 minutes ago, exchemist said:

As a matter of fact, study of natural products has always been, and continues to be, very important in pharmaceutical research. Here is an article reviewing the topic:

https://academic.oup.com/jimb/article/43/2-3/249/5995725?login=false

An example from personal experience is the chemotherapy drug Taxol, which my late wife took for ovarian cancer (It did a good job but made her hair fall out). This was isolated from the Pacific yew tree  and was found at the time of its discovery to be one of the most effective of some 12,000 natural compounds being studied for therapeutic use.: https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/misc/ag_654/volume_1/taxus/brevifolia.htm

What modern medicine does not do, however, is adopt traditional plant remedies without first isolating the active ingredient, understanding its mode of action and trialling in a controlled way to check its efficacy, safety and the optimum dose to use. By the time all that is done and the active ingredient is available as a drug, you may no longer realise it is in fact a natural remedy.   

Well also part of problem with herbal medicine or mushrooms or any think like that some one will say like take this leaf, flower, plant, oil or tree or some thing like that in nature for such a problem well in the past but later on the reference of naturopathy came up.

Where before you have some Indian native tribe or some group or culture say when we get sick we took this and got better so you can take it. 

Where naturopathy take this step way higher up by subscribing to magic bullet take this oil or plant and it cure all these diseases and problems.  Or you need to cleanse your body and it cure any problem. Where it sounds way too good to be true.

And may be that is why lack of research into herbal medicine because of naturopathy than the traditional medicine man shop owner with millions of herbs, oils, plants and such on the shelf. 

Where naturopathy like to sell package of this wonder oil or plant that does every thing it cures all kinds of diseases. 

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7 hours ago, nec209 said:

It seems today medicinal herbs, herbal medicines , herbs , mushrooms are viewed has snake oil medicine or mixed results today.

Because, in fact, they give mixed results.
Plants are very variable.

The lack of a good profit margin is also a factor.
Did you know the prototype statin was derived from a fungus?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_yeast_rice

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I think other major problem with naturopathy is the confusion with the traditional medicine man and no set protocol.

You go to one naturopathy they use Florotherapy - flower treatment, Fungotherapy - treatment with mushrooms, Enotherapy - wine treatment, Dendrotherapy - treatment through "communication with trees",  Lithotherapy - treatment with stones and minerals,Music therapy - treatment of the music.

Than you go to other naturopathy they don’t use that above like the other naturopathy but use Thalassotherapy - treatment with seaweed, salts, mud, Phytotherapy - Herbal Medicine, Homeopathy is a type of alternative medicine that involves the use of highly diluted drugs, Hirudotherapy - treatment using leeches, Heliotherapy - treatment with sunlight, Halotherapy - treatment in an artificial microclimate chamber with a highly dispersed aerosol of sodium chloride.

Than you go see third naturopathy and they using some thing very different like Aromatherapy - Aromatherapy, Aerophytotherapy - treatment with the help of essential oils of medicinal plants, Apitherapy - treatment with bee products, Aeroionotherapy - treatment with negatively charged ions or using very different herbs than the other naturopathy.

So in way the naturopathy are all over place using very different treatments and no set protocol on treatments.

And the schools they go to become naturopathy can be very different learning from one school to other.

So in way naturopathy has done lot of damage to the traditional medicine man and alternative medicine.

Edited by nec209
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6 hours ago, swansont said:

I think part of the story is that there’s no patent protection for existing treatments, unless you can isolate some unique compound. So no incentive to go through the expense of clinical trials. You can sell it as a supplement but it’s a bit like selling a generic after patents expire.

That was actually just a challenge to nec209 to do a little research. Pharmacology didn't just suddenly "start" as big companies; it has been an ongoing process of discovery and experimentation since the stone age. In the modern world of commerce, it operates - like everything else - according to the rules of the market. Patents and profits on one side, regulation and licensing on the other, public and private interests in contention or balance.

There are fewer restrictions on herbal supplements than on synthetic drugs for several reasons, one of them being that most herbal remedies are usually far less potent and  less harmful when used incorrectly. Another part of the reason is that there is not enough recent, recognized data available to the legislators. In the last part of the 19th and mot of the 20th century, western people were enamoured of technology, industry, manufactury, organized, regimented, documented Science. A good deal of existing older knowledge was neglected and undervalued. In the past few decades, there has been a shift in attitude, as we recognize the costs of technology, etc. 

People in large numbers follow fads. When 'natural' and 'plant-based' become popular buzz-words, that what they buy, and when that's what they buy, that's what the businesses that want to sell them stuff will manufacture. Morphine/heroin/opium was always made of poppy juice, whether it came in a pipe or a syringe - it's just marketed differently, according to the fashion and law of the times.  

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1 hour ago, nec209 said:

I think other major problem with naturopathy is the confusion with the traditional medicine man and no set protocol.

You go to one naturopathy they use Florotherapy - flower treatment, Fungotherapy - treatment with mushrooms, Enotherapy - wine treatment, Dendrotherapy - treatment through "communication with trees",  Lithotherapy - treatment with stones and minerals,Music therapy - treatment of the music.

Than you go to other naturopathy they don’t use that above like the other naturopathy but use Thalassotherapy - treatment with seaweed, salts, mud, Phytotherapy - Herbal Medicine, Homeopathy is a type of alternative medicine that involves the use of highly diluted drugs, Hirudotherapy - treatment using leeches, Heliotherapy - treatment with sunlight, Halotherapy - treatment in an artificial microclimate chamber with a highly dispersed aerosol of sodium chloride.

Than you go see third naturopathy and they using some thing very different like Aromatherapy - Aromatherapy, Aerophytotherapy - treatment with the help of essential oils of medicinal plants, Apitherapy - treatment with bee products, Aeroionotherapy - treatment with negatively charged ions or using very different herbs than the other naturopathy.

So in way the naturopathy are all over place using very different treatments and no set protocol on treatments.

And the schools they go to become naturopathy can be very different learning from one school to other.

So in way naturopathy has done lot of damage to the traditional medicine man and alternative medicine.

What you say may be true but in the end the key distinction is that what you call "western" medicine is science-based. That involves not only verifying by controlled trials the effectiveness of a therapy, but also the other things I mentioned, do to with identifying the active agent, optimising the dose, checking safety and so forth, so that you understand as fully as possible what you are doing to the patient when you use it and you do so to the best possible advantage.

Your traditional medicine man does little of this. He is not, after all, a scientist. He may not know why what he does works - or perhaps not even whether it works at all. Open-minded science will take note of what is said to work and will investigate to see what can be learned from it.     

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2 minutes ago, exchemist said:

What you say may be true but in the end the key distinction is that what you call "western" medicine is science-based. That involves not only verifying by controlled trials the effectiveness of a therapy, but also the other things I mentioned, do to with identifying the active agent, optimising the dose, checking safety and so forth, so that you understand as fully as possible what you are doing to the patient when you use it and you do so to the best possible advantage.

Of course. All medicine is science-based. Science evolved along with civilizations, and knowledge evolves along with science. The methodology recognized by one generation may be different from what was accepted by a previous generation, but the chemistry is constant. What was an active ingredient in ancient China or pre Columbian America is still an active ingredient, still has the same effect, administered in a different format. In the past two or three decades, quite a lot of those traditional remedies have been subjected to modern scientific scrutiny, yielding some valuable new insights - and therapies. 

6 minutes ago, exchemist said:

Your traditional medicine man does little of this.

The medicine men, shamans, doctors and herbalists, alchemists and witches of the past - a whole lot of past, 100,000 or so years of past - were also scientists and did know quite a lot of things about their environment and the properties of their potions. Modern science didn't leap, fully-formed, from Lister's forehead in 1870 - he, too, stood on the shoulders of all those tall, short and medium-sized researchers who went before. 

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11 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Of course. All medicine is science-based. Science evolved along with civilizations, and knowledge evolves along with science. The methodology recognized by one generation may be different from what was accepted by a previous generation, but the chemistry is constant. What was an active ingredient in ancient China or pre Columbian America is still an active ingredient, still has the same effect, administered in a different format. In the past two or three decades, quite a lot of those traditional remedies have been subjected to modern scientific scrutiny, yielding some valuable new insights - and therapies. 

The medicine men, shamans, doctors and herbalists, alchemists and witches of the past - a whole lot of past, 100,000 or so years of past - were also scientists and did know quite a lot of things about their environment and the properties of their potions. Modern science didn't leap, fully-formed, from Lister's forehead in 1870 - he, too, stood on the shoulders of all those tall, short and medium-sized researchers who went before. 

Some were, certainly, in their own way. But none of them did, or do, the things I described, which are routine in science-based medicine.

I have been trying to answer the question posed in the OP, as to why such traditional medicine has become used less in modern times.  

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1 hour ago, Peterkin said:

And I'm saying: It's not used less; it's used in different forms. The chemistry doesn't change - only the methods of extraction and recombination grow ever more sophisticated as knowledge builds on knowledge. 

It probably is used less, though. If you get sick, some people will use modern medicine if such treatment is available to them, which means they are not using "traditional" medicine. The ones who partake of modern medicine will try other approaches if the original treatment fails.

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Let me say from the word go that I always have and always will follow the path of modern medicines and the science behind them. In saying that, and having been crowned the "Tui ni Vatu lailai" 😉in Fiji, that the traditional root yaqona, commonly known as kava, has been found to have soporific and relaxant properties. So much so that it can now be purchased at chemists throughout Australia in tablet form. 

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