Neem A Tree for Solving Global Problems (1992) / Chapter Skim
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7 Medicinals
7 Medicinals
Pages 60-70
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From page 60... ...
Thus, over thousands of years, millions of Asians have used neem medicinally. In addition, in places where the tree has been introduced in recent times such as tropical America and Africa, it has also established a reputation as a useful cure for various ailments.
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From page 61... ...
· Salmonella typhosa.4 This much-feared bacterium, which lives in food and water, causes typhoid, food poisoning, and a variety of infections that include blood poisoning and intestinal inflammation. Current antibiotics are of only uncertain help in treating it.
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From page 62... ...
Experiments with smallpox, chicken pox, and fowl pox suggest that there may be a true biological basis for this practice. Crude neem extracts absorbed the viruses, effectively preventing them from entering uninfected cells.5 Unfortunately, no antiviral effects were seen once the infection was established within the cell.
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From page 63... ...
It claims that its tests prove neem bark to be highly effective at both preventing and healing gum inflammations and periodontal disease. CHAGAS' DISEASE Extracts of neem reportedly affect the kissing bugs that transmit the much-feared Chagas' disease (see sidebar, page 641.
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From page 64... ...
Kissing bugs often defecate while they are feeding, and when the victim wakes up and scratches the itchy bump, the excrement, together with the parasite's infective stage, is rubbed into the wound and enters the bloodstream. So far, there is no truly satisfactory control for this dread disease, but laboratories in Germany and Brazil have recently produced the makings of a possible breakthrough .
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From page 65... ...
controlling this major health problem in Latin America, although delivering neem materials to these tiny bloodsuckers in rural hovels is perhaps impossible in practice. The research was done both in Germany and Brazil, and has shown that feeding neem to the bugs not only frees them of parasites, but azadirachtin prevents the young insects from molting and the adults from reproducing.
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From page 66... ...
may be reached after three years." Photos from India show an evergreen with wellleafed branches forming a thick canopy. Yet this specimen in dryland Africa is barely one meter tall, a twig holding grimly onto life in what should be the favorable environment of an agroforestry research station.
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From page 67... ...
In India, it was recently reported that components of the ethanol extract of neem leaves and seeds were effective against chloroquinesensitive and chloroquine-resistant strains of the malaria parasite.'2 Although all the different extracts tested suppressed the growth of parasites within 72 hours, the most potent were the ethanol extracts of neem leaves and the medium-polar extracts of neem seeds. Although these are preliminary results, they indicate a potentially valuable line of research.
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From page 68... ...
All in all, they conclude, neem oil has particular potential for widespread use by the poor. It seems likely to be the cheapest contraceptive available, and villagers in remote areas may well accept it as a regular method of birth control because sophisticated methods are financially beyond their reach and because they are extremely apprehensive about sterilization and other sophisticated methods.
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From page 69... ...
Some examples follow: ~ Maggots Indians have traditionally crushed neem leaves and rubbed them into open wounds on cattle to eliminate maggots. · Horn flies As noted in chapter 5, azadirachtin passes through the ruminant digestive tract and remains long enough that horn flies will not develop in the manure.
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From page 70... ...
In Germany, toxicological tests using oil obtained from clean neem kernels resulted in no toxicity, even at a concentration of 5,000 mg per kg of body weight in rats. Nonetheless, caution is called for.
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