There’s a new “Jewish pencillicin” in town, and it isn’t a steaming bowl of shmaltzy soup:
Israeli virologist Dr. Madeleine Mumcuoglu has developed a product that combines elderberry with modern medicine to produce a flu remedy that actually works. (No, it’s not Elton John’s Elderberry Wine.)
The clinical research on Sambucol, marketed by Mumcuoglu’s Jersualem-based company Razeibar, shows the remedy to significantly cut the time one suffers from flu symptoms and is “at least 99% effective against the avian flu virus, H5N1, and in cell cultures significantly neutralized the infectivity of the virus.” Full story.
This is excellent news, because Esther’s questioning was giving me a massive brain burp: If you have avian flu, and you eat chicken soup made from a chicken with avian flu, will the flus cancel each other out?
Hat tip to Jewtastic!
That’s really Jewtastic of Jewtastic to share this info. But I–and any member of Hadassah’s membership or leadership–knew about Sambucol years ago. Like five years ago.
The news here is its relevance to avian flu, which is of course wonderful, and doesn’t matter who heard about it first. As long as it helps people.
Sorry about the brain burp. But imagine running around with thoughts like that in your head ALL THE TIME.