After 20 years of clinical practice, students often ask me if I could only have one herb to treat patients, what would it be. I never hesitate garlic. The reason is simple, this one herb can do so many things from healing raging infections and combating life threatening diseases to healing tonsillitis and lowering cholesterol levels. This herb grows all over the world, and I have used it successfully in clinics from India to my clinic in California. This one herb literally has hundreds of healing uses; no one should be without it.
Garlic’s Powerful History
Garlic, known botanically as allium sativum, is certainly one of nature’s miracle plants. It has been worshipped since the beginning of recorded history for its ability to heal and strengthen the body. The ancient Egyptians fed it to the slave laborers who built the great pyramids. It was known 6,000 years ago to increase strength and endurance and heal disease. The Greek Spartan warriors and later the Roman legions consumed garlic in copious amounts. Much of their strength, endurance and ability to resist disease was attributed to their garlic consumption.
Hippocrates, the so-called father of modern medicine, was actually an herbalist and natural healer. He used garlic to treat many diseases and specifically cancer.
As recently as World War I and II, the British government used garlic in the battlefield hospitals. It was so effective that the British government asked its people to grow it in their backyards as part of their war effort. It is credited with saving tens of thousands of lives. It was used in various preparations to disinfect and heal battle wounds, including just chopped raw and spread on moss and strapped to bullet and shrapnel wounds. Many older army doctors I have talked with in Great Britain say it worked better than any of the modern sulphur powders and antibiotics that were later introduced as battlefield wound treatment. They told me it was used internally to successfully treat typhoid fever and dysentery.
Garlic is prescribed by medical doctors outside of the U.S. for many diseases especially hypertension (high blood pressure), high cholesterol and cancer. It is a broad spectrum antibiotic, antiviral agent and fungicide.
Garlic is Famous or its Healing Power with Heart Disease.
Heart disease is the #1 cause of death in the United States today. This year almost 1 million people will die that’s about 2 people a minute. 99% of all these deaths are caused by cholesterol and saturated fat blocking the coronary arteries. Attention was first put on garlic as a cardiac remedy when researchers noticed that in countries that had high garlic consumption, the incidence of heart disease was much lower than average; and in many countries even nonexistent.
Garlic has been found to lower serum cholesterol and triglyceride levels and reduce the buildup of atherosclerotic plaque in our arteries. It does this partly by increasing our blood levels of high density lipo-proteins (HDL’s). These lipo-proteins clear out blood of excess cholesterol and fat. Garlic also lowers our low density lipoproteins (LDL’s) which deposit fat into the blood and contributes to arterial plaque.
Medical researchers have also found substances in garlic that inhibit platelet aggregation, the process that causes your blood to clot. This is just another way that garlic can reduce your risk of heart attack.
High blood pressure is a worldwide disease and in every study garlic has been proven conclusively to reduce hypertension. Because of its powerful effect on blood pressure, the Japanese Food and Drug Administration has approved garlic and now it is an official drug listed in the Japanese Pharmacopoeia.
If you are looking for a safe and effective remedy for heart disease, garlic is a great choice. Whether you have high blood pressure, high cholesterol and triglycerides, arterial plaque or clotting, garlic is for you. Anyone with a history of heart attack, heart disease or stroke should be on a daily dose of raw garlic for the rest of their life.
Garlic has Proven to be an Effective Cancer Therapy, Too
The National Cancer Institute has reported that cancer incidence worldwide is lowest in the countries where garlic consumption is highest France, Spain and Italy. In the few isolated rural areas of the world where there is NO incidence of cancer, the garlic consumption was also the highest reported.
Garlic has been shown to help our white blood cells defend us against cancer and also to increase our ability to destroy tumors. When the properties of garlic are present in the bloodstream, many aspects of our immunity are enhanced. Garlic has also been found to stimulate interferon production, enhance natural killer cells, stop tumor growth and reduce the associated pain of cancer.
Colorectal cancer is on the rise. In the United States and many other areas of the world, it is one of the most common cancers among men and women together as a group. According to the Merck Manual, every American if they live long enough will have diverticulosis due to constipation. These herniations cause infections, irritations and can lead to cancer. Garlic has been found in double blind studies to reduce the incidence of colorectal cancer.
Garlic has also been reported to reduce stomach cancer. In one medical university study, garlic was shown to reduce stomach cancer 10 times more effectively than the non-garlic-eating group.
Garlic with its over 80 different sulphur compounds is a free radical scavenger. This is just another way that garlic will protect you from cancer and suppress toxin and chemical induced cancer.
Garlic is a Powerful Antibiotic
Garlic juice diluted 1 part in 125,000 has been found to inhibit the growth of bacteria. In fact, in other tests, just the odor of garlic was used to destroy bacteria, so you could actually be healing your friends by eating garlic and then breathing on them. Garlic destroys both gram positive and gram negative bacteria making it a broad spectrum antibiotic. Garlic’s use as an antibacterial agent in Russia is so esteemed it has been nicknamed “Russian penicillin.”
Pharmaceutical antibiotics are nonselective in their destruction of bacteria in your bodythey just destroy all. This creates many problems because our body has millions of friendly bacteria that are required for proper digestion and other metabolic functions. This is why many people after a course of antibiotic therapy have digestive problems, constipation, and yeast and fungal overgrowth infections. Our bodies also become immune to these antibiotics and over time create dangerous resistant strains of bacteria. Numerous magazines, newspapers and television shows in America have covered this issue in the last few years.
It seems as though we are now paying the price for indiscriminate antibiotic usage. There is a whole new group of bacteria, like flesh-eating bacteria, for which antibiotics are now useless.
Garlic has amazed scientists by being selective in its bacteria destruction, killing bacteria that is harmful to our body, while actually enhancing our friendly bacteria and improving our intestinal flora and digestion.
Garlic destroys many types of bacteria incl uding streptococcus, staphylococcis, typhoid, diptheria, cholera, bacterial dysentery (traveler’s diarrhea), tuberculosis, tetanus, rheumatic bacteria even the bacteria that causes leprosy and many others.
Garlic is a Powerful Antiviral and Antifungal Agent as Well
Some say that the reason you don’t catch colds when you eat garlic is because no one will come close enough to you to spread their germs. This may be true, but it is also because garlic is a powerful antiviral agent. Many feel it’s the cure for the common cold.
Garlic also keeps the white blood cells (your immune cells) from sticking together, too. One of the ways that viruses spread through your body is by passing from one white blood cell to another. Scientific studies show that if your white blood cells are sticking together or abnormally close to each other that this will assist the virus in spreading and growing. This is especially true with the HIV virus.
Garlic’s antifungal ability is second to none. In the laboratory it has proved to be more potent than known antifungal drugs. Garlic will regulate the overgrowth of candida albicans.
The Truth About Garlic Supplements
Over the last 30 years I have seen every garlic supplement touted to the public with claims of “better than fresh garlic,” “more concentrated” and the new “standardized.” This doesn’t make any sense. How could any pill that is made from garlic actually be better than what is fresh and natural? The only thing better and more potent about their garlic products is their advertising.
How much raw garlic can you use?
If you want to see some medicinal benefit from garlic, you must take at least three cloves of raw garlic a day.
Three cloves of raw garlic a day, chewed or chopped up and added to food is not a killer dose and will clean your body out in many ways as already discussed. If you have a very sensitive gastrointestinal system, start with half a clove and work your way up.
I received a letter from an 83 year old lady last year. She had a viral lung infection that was killing her. She had it for 9 months. The medical doctors and all of their antibiotics, antivirals and other drugs had not helped her, and she had been told she would die. She read one of my articles on garlic and decided she had nothing to lose. She consumed cloves of raw garlic a day and in three days her killer viral lung infection was gone!
If You Don’t Like the Smell of Garlic, Try a Cover-Up
Over the years, the only successful way I have found to use garlic and not offend your co-workers and loved ones is to cover it up. My patients and I have tried all of the products that you swallow parsley tablets, everything, but we still stank. Finally, I just tried to cover it up with a few drops of peppermint oil in the mouth, and it worked great. In the health food store you can usually find some peppermint oil, tee tree oil or natural breath fresheners that will do the trick.
Reprinted from To Your Health! Jan/Feb 1999
Dr. Schulze has a Clinical Herbal Pharmacy in California where all of his formulae are available through mail order. Call Toll-Free at 877-TEACH-ME (877-832-2463).
