Sweet wormwood is an increasingly popular medicinal plant that is used to treat many diseases and cancers. The main medicinal ingredient is artemisinin. Learn all about this medicinal plant.
Sweet wormwood plant
The sweet wormwood plant (lat. Artemisia annua), which is originally from North Asia, belongs to the family Asteraceae. This plant has a head inflorescence and is related to bitter wormwood, a plant that is much more popular than sweet wormwood around the world. Sweet wormwood is an extremely medicinal plant, and it is best known for being able to cure cancer.
What does it look like and where to find it?
Sweet wormwood is a herbaceous plant and is characterized by fern-like leaves, has pale yellow small-headed inflorescence and a camphor-like scent, and the aromatic scent of the leaves is particularly intense. It can grow up to 2 m high, has no hair, and is characterized by an upright stem with alternately placed twigs and alternately placed leaves about 5 cm long.
Sweet wormwood habitat:
Sweet wormwood originates from North Asia, as we said, and is especially used in China, where it is mandatory in Chinese traditional medicine, while in Indonesia it is grown as an ornamental plant. Sanas is a sweet wormwood plant that is successfully grown all over the world, so it is available even in different parts of North America. Sweet wormwood grows on slopes, along forest edges and devastated areas.
Sweet wormwood is used as a medicine, primarily thanks to its active ingredient called artemisinin. The content of artemisinin in dried leaves of sweet wormwood is between 0 and 1.5%. New Artemisia annua hybrids developed in Switzerland can reach artemisinin contents of up to 2%.
Sweet wormwood as a medicine is most often used for malaria. It contains a chemical that can be changed in the laboratory to be more effective against malaria. This laboratory product is sold as a prescription drug for malaria in Asia, Africa, and Europe. Malaria is a serious disease caused by a parasite that is transmitted by the bite of infected mosquitoes and attacks the red blood cells of humans.
Sweet wormwood as a medicine has a pronounced antimicrobial effect, and is also used for bacterial infections such as dysentery and tuberculosis; diseases caused by worms, other parasites and mites; Fungal Infections; and viral infections such as the common cold.
Other uses include treatment of upset stomach, fever, jaundice, psoriasis, systemic lupus erythematosus and other autoimmune disorders, loss of appetite, vascular disorders, constipation, gallbladder disorders, abdominal pain, painful menstruation and joint pain (rheumatism).
People with AIDS sometimes use sweet wormwood to prevent the often fatal type of lung infection called pneumocystis pneumonia caused by a fungus.
Sweet wormwood as a medicine is sometimes applied directly to the skin for bacterial and fungal infections, arthritis, and other joint pains, bruises, nervous pain and joint pain.
Sweet wormwood as a cure
Sweet wormwood as a cure for cancer is increasingly valued because it exhibits cytotoxicity against cancer cells. However, research on this topic is still ongoing.
Currently, the use of sweet diapers to treat cancer is a major area of interest. Initial research conducted on cancer cells in vitro showed that artemisinin from this plant can help eliminate these cells by promoting apoptosis (cell death).
Cancer cells require iron to replicate their cell structures when they separate. Because cancer cells have higher concentrations of iron than normal cells, it has been suggested that mechanisms that target and kill cells that have only high iron levels may be an effective way to attack tumors without affecting healthy cells.
Artemisinin has been shown to do just that. When this compound from the sweet wormwood plant comes in contact with high levels of iron, it breaks down in a way that creates free radical particles. These free radicals destroy cancer cells with some kind of prooxidative effect.
However, only cancer cells are targeted by oxidative damage; healthy cells that do not have elevated iron levels remain intact.
The University of Washington is just one of many that have conducted such studies on sweet wormwood in relation to breast cancer. Studies at the University of Washington have turned their attention to leukemia, with promising results in terms of the percentage of cancer cells remaining after the introduction of artemisinin.
For example, leukemia cells have as much as 1000 times higher iron concentration than normal cells. Artemisinin triggers a chemical reaction that results in the production of free radicals that attack these cell membranes.
How does sweet wormwood work as a medicine?
Sweet wormwood contains a chemical called artemisinin, which acts as a medicine against parasites that cause malaria. Some drug manufacturers make anti-malarial drugs from artemisinin that have been modified in the laboratory.
Sweet wormwood should not be used as the only therapy for malaria, because it can only inactivate the parasites that cause malaria, without actually killing them. The amount of artemisinin in sweet wormwood may be too small to kill all the parasites that cause malaria, but large enough for these parasites to become resistant to further treatment with stronger anti-malarial drugs that also contain artemisinin.
Many researchers are exploring new ways to increase the amount of artemisinin in sweet wormwood.
Sweet wormwood tea
How is sweet wormwood tea made? Sweet wormwood tea is prepared by pouring 1 tablespoon of dried leaves of the plant with 250 ml of boiled water. Then the tea is covered and left to stand for about 15–20 minutes (maybe overnight), then strained and drunk. Sweet wormwood tea should be drunk 1–2 cups a day. Sweet wormwood tea has antimalarial and anticancer effects.
Sweet wormwood tincture
Sweet wormwood tincture is available on the market today, and you can make it yourself.
All you have to do is mix 200 ml of pure alcohol and 100 g of fresh, finely chopped sweet wormwood leaves and let it stand for 14 days. Then strain and use as needed.
Dosage:
Dissolve 20–40 drops in a glass of lukewarm water, tea or natural juice 3 times a day. Take a break after 8 days of using sweet wormwood tincture for 3 days, then repeat the cycle as needed.
Experiences
If you mention the sweet wormwood plant to anyone, the first association for almost everyone is a cure for cancer. However, when it comes to natural cancer treatment, experiences are very individual and this is generally a very sensitive topic. Therefore, the experience regarding the use and effectiveness of the sweet wormwood plant against cancer is quite limited for now.
This plant is not so popular in our area yet, and many tend to mix it with a related species, bitter wormwood. Therefore, fake preparations of sweet wormwood are often present on the market. Research on the use of this plant against cancer is still very limited, but in the world, sweet wormwood is highly valued as a cure for cancer, as evidenced by numerous positive experiences. It is considered to be effective especially in iron therapy.
Bitter wormwood
Bitter wormwood is a large branched herbaceous plant, characterized by silver leaves, specific aroma and bitter taste.
If used in the appropriate dose, bitter wormwood has a healing effect, while in an overdose it has an intoxicating effect.
The famous hallucinogenic drink absinthe is named after its basic ingredient wormwood, which gives it these properties.
Bitter wormwood is mostly used as a medicine because of its antiparasitic action, and it is one of the best medicines for digestion.
Bitter and sweet wormwood difference
There is a difference between bitter wormwood and sweet wormwood, and it should be mentioned that there is also wild wormwood - Artemisia vulgaris. Artemisia absinthium garden or bitter wormwood, is known as the main ingredient used for absinthe.
This type has been promoted as a useful alternative treatment for cancer, although so far scientific evidence cannot support these effects. Thus, wormwood has no proven anti-cancer effect. Bitter wormwood is used for indigestion, as an essential oil and insecticide.
Bitter wormwood also contains thujone, a volatile oil that can lead to kidney and liver problems. Not recommended for consumption in high quantities.
However, sweet diaper has long been used in traditional forms of herbal medicine and does not contain the same harmful amounts of thujone.
Sweet wormwood or Artemisia annua usually grows in the western regions of Asia, North Africa and Europe, although it is now developing in North America as well. The primary active ingredient in sweet wormwood is artemisinin, which is now widely accepted as a conventional medical treatment for malaria.
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