1:00 AM
No Name
Two weeks
ago I developed a chest cold, and because I sometimes struggle with asthma, that means three weeks of coughing misery. Fortunately I have medication
that helps. But I started to wonder what people did before the advent of modern
asthma inhalers and treatments.
Here’s one old remedy
I found:
Take the root of skunk cabbage, and boil it
until very strong, then strain off the liquor; to which add, one table-spoonful
of garlic juice to one pint of the liquor, and simmer them together. Dose, one
table-spoonful, three times a day. (1)
My first
reaction was, “yuck!” Anyone who’s wandered around damp ground and stepped on
skunk cabbage knows why it’s called skunk cabbage. It has a fetid odor some people compare to that
of a skunk. But when I investigated further, to my surprise I found quite a few
references to its usefulness. (Not only that, but skunk cabbage extract is still
available for sale.)
Among the references
I found was this old one:
The root of this plant is a very strong
antispasmodic, expectorant, and nervine. It is used with great success in
asthma, croup, and hysterics. . .and also in tusis senales, or that kind of
cough which frequently attends old persons without much expectoration. (2)
Modern
skunk cabbage extracts claim those kinds of benefits and more.
Indians used
skunk cabbage as an expectorant in asthma. They also used the roots
or leaves for a poultice on sores and swellings, and to draw out splinters and
thorns. The root hairs were used to stop hemorrhage.
In 1820
through 1882, the dried root stalk and roots of skunk cabbage were listed as an
official drug in the USP (U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention).
Skunk
cabbage extract by itself is beginning to look pretty good, but add to it garlic, and the above
remedy looks better and better. Garlic has antioxidant properties and the
ability to enhance the body’s immune cell activity. It also helps maintain healthy
blood circulation. It can help lower blood pressure. Oh, and garlic is a good
choice for killing and expelling parasites such as pin worms from the human
body. (There’s a useful tidbit.)
The active
component in garlic is the sulfur compound called allicin, which acts like an antibiotic to help the body inhibit the ability of germs to grow and
reproduce. It's said that 1 milligram of allicin has a potency of 15 standard
units of penicillin.
So I had to
take a step back from my initial negative reaction to this old time asthma
remedy. It may have been quite effective. The skunk cabbage extract might have helped the asthma attack itself, and the garlic would have prevented a possible infection.
That doesn’t mean I’m going to gather skunk cabbage roots and whip up a mess of skunk cabbage asthma remedy. I can just imagine my husband's reaction to that
concoction cooking on the stove. For now I’ll stick to my prescriptions.
(1) Ladies Indispensable Assistant, F.J. Dow
& Co., 139 Nassau Street, New York, 1850, pg. 12
(2) The Domestic Physician, and Family Assistant,
Marlin Gardner & Benjamin H. Aylworth, H. & E. Phinney of Cooperstown, New
York, 1836, pg.34
Other
references:
American Indian Medicine, Virgil J.
Vogel, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Publishing Division of the
University, 1970.
About Skunk Cabbage:
Extract for Sale:
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