Asafetida vs. Amantidine vs. Tamiflu vs. ‘Scamiflu’ vs. H1N1

It’s true. I have focused on Food Farmacy for a couple of years, not just now when health plans and organic gardens are being discussed on Pennsylvania Avenue. Food Farmacy might be the answer to a cheaper, healthier American. I have long claimed that spices are among the most potent of medicinal foods. I even hinted that garlic might be better than Tamiflu for the flus running rampant around here in 2009. No one knows for sure until they have been clinically compared. In my present status of ignorance, I’d surely take garlic if I had swine flu. Garlic is the most frequent medicinal plant in my Green Farmacy Garden (GFG). But at age 80, I might also take the Tamiflu if I happened to have some on hand, suggesting that the natural and the synthetic might (as so often happens) be synergic. I have not and probably will not take any flu vaccinations this season.

Back during the summer, we workers in the GFG were having vegetable soup with garlic and garlic toast when I decided to show the garden director a garlic necklace braided for me back during the anthrax scare. This brought back memories for one of the garden volunteers, whose South Carolina ancestors had worn another herbal necklace back around the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918. They wore the spice called asafetida, Ferula assa-fetida, in a necklace in the belief that it prevented respiratory disorders. Curiosity piqued, I started looking into this and found the following quote in my good friend Art Tucker’s The Big Book of Herbs: “Pennsylvania German schoolchildren once wore this as an amulet around the neck to ward off colds.”¹

Perhaps you can imagine my childish enthusiasm upon reading shortly later that the asafetida contained nine antiviral compounds. Yes, Taiwanese scientists published an exciting paper, suggesting that the spice Ferula assa-fetida, known colloquially simply as asafetida, contains at least nine phytochemicals more potent (IC50 0.26–0.86 ug/ml) against the influenza A virus (H1N1) than amantadine.² Almost all flu is already resistant to the single silver bullet amantadine, but probably none are resistant to the mix of nine natural antivirals in asafetida. I get all excited when science vindicates the folk medicinal lore. So this was super-exciting. I’ll wager that the asafetida studied by the Taiwanese is much better than amantadine for H1N1; more potent even than the Tamiflu, which is hard to find; and is being price-gauged by pharmacies as I draft this rant.³ A container of asafetida can be purchased at ethnic shops for $2 or $3; the Tamiflu prescription often tops $100.

By the time the FDA arrived for a tour of the GFG (Oct. 8, 2009), I had a container of asafetida, which Asian Indians sometimes call hing. As mentioned, I had many garlic plants in the GFG, in more than 25% of the 80 plots for several different indications. But my garden (like, I fear, all American gardens) contains no living asafetida. Dr. Tucker tells me on good authority that there is no living asafetida in the US. It comes from Afghanistan and similar areas in the Middle and Far East. If it proves as promising as my enthusiasm lets me venture, it might make a better alternative crop for the opium poppy than saffron. If Afghans are as corrupt as they claimed on CNN TV (Nov. 18, 2009), there could be a black market developed for viable seed of the asafetida, and the plant will soon show up in medicinal plant gardens around the world. That might gradually contribute to stockpiles of asafetida, which I’ll venture would be truly more worthwhile than the hoarded stockpiles of Tamiflu.

On Oct. 22, 2009, a USDA delegation came to GFG for a special tour. I was introducing them to my new Rodale book, The Green Pharmacy Guide to Healing Foods. The H1N1 virus was on everyone’s mind. During my talk, I wore an amulet of asafetida around my neck, hoping that the flu would flee. We also made some film and radio clips, some of which have already aired. To the best of my knowledge, nobody got the flu. But wearing my asafetida amulet, and reeking of fresh garlic that I ingested during the tour, I noted that virus-bearing guests seemed to keep their distance. I didn’t get the flu (yet). I don’t know that any of the visitors did either.

Asafetida is said to be the “secret” ingredient in Worcestershire sauce. It’s so secret, it’s not named on the label of the Lea & Perrins bottle I have (“Ingredients: water, vinegar, molasses, high fructose corn syrup, anchovies, hydrolyzed soy and corn protein, onions, tamarinds, salt, garlic, cloves, chili peppers, natural flavorings, and shallots”). But we don’t even know how much asafetida is in those “natural flavorings,” the next to last ingredient in the sauce.

We don’t even know how much asafetida is in that sample which I had hanging around my neck. Now at noon on Nov. 21, 2009, I am indulging in my new and modified “Scamiflu.” It doesn’t taste any better or worse with or without this added asafetida. Worcestershire sauce tastes better to me and smells much better than the Compounded Asafetida Powder imported from India. The label on that product quantifies only the nutritional value, not the three named ingredients: “Gum Arabic; Wheat Starch, Asafoetida.”

Nutritional Value

( per 100g )

Carbohydrate 73.28 g

Protein 10.14

Fat 1.00 g

Calcium 0.33

Sodium 0.05

Iron 0.02

Vit. C 2.35

There’s no way, short of analysis, that I can extrapolate. What quantity, if any, of the nine new antiviral compounds are in the Compounded Asafoetida Powder or in the Worcestershire sauce? I would suspect that the Taiwanese scientists could readily tell which, if any, are present and whether they are there in significant quantities. I’d really like to see a comparison of each, both in vitro and in vivo, with Tamiflu against H1N1.

Scamiflu

Toast Donald Rumsfeld, who is said to benefit economically from sales of Tamiflu. Enjoy a quick flight into Food Farmacy Fantasy. Toast Rumsfeld with Scamiflu. Savor a cup of my Spiced Scamiflu Soup. Since it is intended as a food and is a good food, not a medicine, no prescription will be needed. Nor is a prescription intended. It is simply a food, an herbal broth, coincidentally with many edible antiviral constituents, It takes only a minute to cook. The ingredients are already in most kitchens. Dice one to two cloves of garlic into a porcelain cup of water. Add, according to taste, 1 to 3 dashes each of Worcestershire sauce, black pepper, cayenne, and curry. Microwave 1 minute. Enjoy! When the flu is going around, you might take this instead of your morning coffee. I’d take up to four cups a day, eating the residual garlic bits. They are still pungent, meaning that they still contain the antiviral alliin and allicin. So far no flu. Make sure your partner is indulging as well. Chase with elderberry juice.

Warning: Scamiflu is an untested food, not a medicine. Scamiflu has been proven to contain antiviral ingredients. Scamiflu has never been investigated clinically. Therefore it cannot be recommended for medicinal purposes. Until Scamiflu has been clinically compared with Tamiflu, no one knows which is better for your new flu or the new rhinovirus.⁵ Scientists will tell you that many viruses are now already resistant to monochemical Tamiflu. News on Nov. 20 and 21, 2009, talks about yet another strain of Tamiflu-resistant H1N1 in North Carolina. I’ll wager ten doses of Tamiflu that my Scamiflu (or garlic alone) will be more efficacious against the new NC Tamiflu–resistant strain. This could be easily and rapidly verified, at least in vitro. And why not do it? All ingredients are foods, if not GRAS. I think that any intelligent unbiased scientific or government agency, apprised of the medicinal potential of Scamiflu and Tamiflu against frequently constantly mutating viruses, would demand such an unbiased clinical comparison of the food with the pharmaceutical. We certainly know that monochemical “silver bullets” rapidly lead to viral resistance, much more rapidly than polychemical shotguns like garlic and asafetida. I feel safe in assuring you that the ingredients species in my herbal Scamiflu contain dozens of proven antiviral compounds that most of our genes have known for hundreds of millennia. Our genes have known synthetic pharmaceuticals less than 200 years. I think that, with proper trials, these Food Farmacy approaches could improve our economy and our health.

James A. (Jim) Duke
8210 Murphy Road
Fulton, MD 20759
301-498-1175

jimduke13@verizon.net

www.greenpharmacy.com

1. Tucker AO, DeBaggio T. 2000. The Big Book of Herbs. Loveland, CO: Interweave Press; 688 pp.

2. Lee C-L, Chiang L-C, Cheng L-H, et al. Influenza A (H1N1) antiviral and cytotoxic agents from Ferula assa-foetida. J Nat Prod. 2009 Sep;72(9):1568–1572.

3. CNN News. Nov. 18, 2009.

4. Duke JA. 2008. The Green Pharmacy Guide to Healing Foods. Rodale Press. 400 pp. Spanish translation.

5. Mentioned on CNN and NBC news, Nov. 19, 2009.