The Text of an Act of Parliament passed in the reign of Henry VIII to protect herbalists from persecution by the Company of Physicians and Chirurgeons.

“WHEREAS in the Parliament held at Westminster in the third year of the King’s most gracious reign, amongst other things for the avoiding of sorceries, witchcraft, and other inconveniences it was enacted that no persons within the city of London, nor within seven miles of the same, should take upon him to exercise and occupy as physician and surgeon, except he be first examined, approved and admitted by the Bishop of London and other, under and upon certain pains and penalties in the same Act mentioned; since the making of which Act the company and fellowship of surgeons in London, minding only their own gain, and doing nothing for the profit or ease of the diseased or patient, have sued, troubled and vexed divers honest persons as well men as women, whom God hath endowed with the knowledge of the nature, kind and operation of certain herbs, roots, and waters, and the using and ministering of them to such as be pained with customable diseases, as women’s breasts being sore, a pain and web in the eye (catarac), scaldings, burnings, sore mouths, the stone, strangury, saucelin (tumour), and morfew (a leprous eruption on the face), and such other like diseases.

And yet the said persons have not taken anything for their pains and skill but have ministered the same to the poor people only for neighbourhood and God’s sake and of pity and charity, and it is now well known that the surgeons admitted would do no cure to any person but where they shall know to be rewarded with a greater sum and reward than the cure extendith unto, for if they would minister their cunning to sore people unrewarded, there should not so many rot and perish to death for lack of help or surgery as daily do.

But the greatest part of surgeons admitted be much more to be blamed than those persons that they trouble, for although the most part of the persons of the said craft of surgeons have small cunning yet they will take great sums of money and do little for it therefore, and by reason thereof they do often times impair and hurt their patients rather than do them good.

IN CONSIDERATION therefor, and for the ease and comfort, succour, help, relief and health of the King’s poor subjects inhabitants of this his realm, now painted or diseased or that hereafter shall be pained or diseased, be it ordained established and enacted by the authority of this present Parliament that at all times from henceforth it shall be lawful to every person being the King’s subject having knowledge and experience of the nature of herbs, roots and waters, or of the operation of the same by speculation or practice, within any part of the realm of England or within any other of the King’s dominions, to practise, use and minister in and to any outward sore, wound, appostemations, outward swelling or disease, any herb or herbs, ointments, baths, poultices and plasters according to their cunning experience and knowledge in any of the diseases, sorces and maladies aforesaid and all other like to the same, or drinks for the stone, strangury or aques without suit, vexation, trouble, penalty, or loss of their goods.

The aforesaid statute in the aforesaid third year of the King’s most gracious reign, or any other act, ordinance or statute to the contrary hereof heretofore made in any wise notwithstanding.

The Prince of Wales’ Duchy Originals firm is to launch a range of herbal remedies with a leading British homeopathic manufacturer.

The new line of herbal tinctures will be officially launched in the New Year and be available in Boots and Waitrose.

Charles watched the new products rolling off the assembly line today as he toured the factory and laboratories of Nelson’s Homeopathic Pharmacy, a natural healthcare company. The family run firm was founded in 1860 and since then has been supplying over the counter remedies to a growing market.

Andrew Baker, Duchy Original’s chief executive officer, said: ‘Duchy Original’s decision to launch a range of herbal tinctures reflects the Prince’s passion for adopting an integrated approach to healthcare.

‘The range is an exciting development for us and will engender more funds for the Prince’s Charities Foundation to which we are donating all our profits.’ Charles has long been an advocate of using complimentary medicine and natural remedies alongside conventional treatments.

Prince Charles established Duchy Originals in 1990 to promote organic food and farming and has since seen the company produce a wide range of goods from biscuits and snacks to wine and toiletries.

The Prince toured the Nelson’s Homeopathic Pharmacy plant in Wimbledon today without the Duchess of Cornwall who pulled out from the visit suffering from a virus, a Clarence House spokeswoman said.

He was taken on a guided tour of Nelson’s Homeopathic Pharmacy factory by brothers Robert and Patrick Wilson, the firm’s chairman and deputy chairman.

The complete manufacturing process was demonstrated to the Prince, from extracting the active ingredients from flowers, many sourced from the UK, to creating the creams and tinctures and then packaging the finished goods.

The firm’s Rescue Remedy, made from natural ingredients, is used to relieve everyday stress and is its best seller.

The heir to the throne wore a white hat and coat as he toured the pristine factory floor. In the automated packaging part of the plant, the Prince stopped in front of worker Jerome Joseph, 21, handling a machine producing the arnica product, taken internally to treat bruising. The Nelson’s Homeopathic Pharmacy employee said afterwards: ‘He said to me “this stuff is good” so it seems like he must have tried it.’

The final stop was the firm’s research and development department where he was shown its latest product – a face wash and toner made from ingredients including lavender and tea tree oil.

Before the Prince left, he gave a brief speech to friends and supporters of the firm and joked that if his wife had taken more remedies, she might have been able to join him.

He added: ‘For many years I’ve had nothing but admiration for what this company has achieved. In fact, I was brought up with Nelson’s Homeopathic Pharmacy really.

‘When I was very small, I remember so well my grandmother having her wonderful leather pouch with all these homeopathic glass phials in it.

‘It was such a feature of my life and as I got older I became more and more aware of the effectiveness of homeopathy and indeed of complementary medicine generally.’

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is expected to soon decide the future of what some in the food industry are calling the holy grail of sweeteners, a low-calorie, natural substance derived from the South American stevia plant. The particular strain of stevia being considered for approval is called Rebaudioside A.

Stevia has been used in Paraguay for centuries and in Japan for decades. It is currently available in the United States mostly in specialty stores and only as a nutritional supplement. Nutritional supplements are regulated less rigorously than other food and drug substances.

What the FDA must decide is whether Rebaudioside A is safe enough to be used as an additive in processed foods, where consumers may not realize it is there. If approved, it would likely be used in massive quantities of processed foods and drinks.

The sweetener is considered “natural,” but that has not silenced some voices of concern.

“Just because it’s natural doesn’t mean that it’s safe,” Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, told “Good Morning America.” “That’s why tests should be done.”

According to Jacobson, stevia may be linked to genetic mutations in lab animals, which could possibly lead to cancer.

“The risk to a given individual is minuscule. Invisible. But when you multiply that very, very tiny risk by 50 million people, 100 million people, that’s a very significant risk,” he said.

But Cargill, which makes a stevia-based sweetener called Truevia, and Merisant, which makes another named Pure Via, both said their products are safe and are applying for FDA approval. True Via and Pure Via are both Rebaudioside A-based.

Recently, international scientists associated with the World Health Organization agreed that these newer forms of stevia sweeteners are safe.

According to industry analyst Mike Richardson of the Freedonia Group, gaining FDA approval is only half the battle for stevia supporters.

“It’s sort of a two-stage thing for these products to be successful — getting FDA approval and then getting consumer approval,” he said.

They range from the everyday to the decidedly obscure, from items with a specific, specialised use to those with a host of applications. Their common heritage is one of the world’s oldest cultures, and their details are being gathered together to guard against theft by the West.

For several years the Indian authorities have been collating information about hundreds of thousands of plants, cures, foods and even yoga poses to create a vast digital database of traditional knowledge dating back to up to 5,000 years ago, available in five international languages.

Now, the first part of that database – relating to ayurveda or traditional Indian medicine – has been completed and it is set to launch the fight back against what some have termed “bio-colonialism”.

“The ayurveda part has been completed,” said Dr Vinod Gupta, the chairman of India’s National Institute for Science Communication and Information Resources (Niscair), which is overseeing the project. “Now we are negotiating an agreement with international patent offices [for access to this database].”

The database, totalling more than 30 million pages and known as the Traditional Knowledge Data Library, has come about for one very simple reason: to prevent Western pharmaceutical giants and others using this traditional Indian information to create a product for which they then obtain a patent.

The danger of such “misappropriation” is all too real. In 1994 an American company was granted a patent for a product based on the seeds of the neem tree, an item that had for centuries been used in India as an insecticide. It took the Indian authorities more than 10 years to have the patent overturned. Similar battles were fought over a product based on the spice turmeric – traditionally used to heal wounds – as well as a Texan company’s attempt to trademark its strain of rice as “Texmati”.

“In 2000 we did a study of the US patent database. We found there were 4,986 patents for products based on medicinal plants,” said Dr Gupta. “Of those around 80 per cent were based on plants from India … 50 percent of those patents should never have been given – there was no change to the traditional knowledge.”

Under international guidelines, patents should not be given if it is shown there is “prior knowledge” or existing information about the product or item. In the United States – where many of the patent applications have been made – this prior existing knowledge is only recognised if the information has been written down. It does not consider information passed down for centuries by means of oral tradition to be valid.

Unlike many cultures from which traditional information has been misappropriated, India has an extensive written tradition. But most of the writing was in languages not widely read in the West. For example ayurvedic texts were written in Sanskrit or Hindi, writings about unani medicine – based on Ancient Greek practices now only practiced in the sub-continent – were in Arabic and Persian, while writings about another form of traditional medicine known as siddha was in the Tamil language.

To get around this challenge, Dr Gupta called in more than 100 practitioners of Ayurveda, siddha and unani to help compile the information using computer software. The database is being made available in Japanese, English, German, French and Spanish and the contents will be made available to patent officials once agreements on protecting the information and preventing it from being passed to corporations, are reached.

Also included within the database are more than 1,500 positions or asanas of yoga. This is because in recent years several yoga teachers in the West have tried to copyright methods of teaching yoga that they are argue are unique but which have existed for centuries in India.

One high-profile case involved Los Angeles-based Bikram Choudhury, the self-styled “yoga teacher to the stars”. Mr Choudhury, who moved to America in the 1970s, first obtained a copyright for a book he wrote. But when other teachers began copying the way he taught yoga – with 26 specific poses performed in a room heated to 41C (105F) – he sought legal advice and was told to obtain a copyright for the moves themselves. It has been recognised by the US courts despite India’s objections.

Dr Dinesh Katoch, an adviser on ayurveda within India’s Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, said more than 50,000 different ayurvedic formulations for treating everything from heart disease to memory loss had been entered into the database. Some of the information is mentioned in the Vedas, the ancient Hindu texts that date back several thousand years.

“We want to use this information for the global benefit but it should be done in a judicious way, not by stealing,” he said, sitting in his office in central Delhi. “We want to prevent misappropriation. Prevention is the most important thing because it is not easy to repeal a patent.”

In addition to the considerable cost incurred by the Indian authorities fighting patents they do not believe are genuine or fair, there is a widespread feeling that Western corporations should not be making vast profits from traditional knowledge while the people who discovered the information receive no benefit.

But campaigners say the misappropriation also has cultural and political implications. “I have termed it bio-colonialism,” said Vandana Shiva, an Indian environmental activist and author.

“The international intellectual property laws as promoted by the World Trade Organisation [WTO] promote bio-colonialism because while they say there should be a global system to patent everything, the reality is that patent inspection is done at a national level. If you want to have a global system you have to have global inspection,” she said. “This would involve setting up a global database. This will take a decade and cost billions of dollars.”

* Arjuna Tree The bark is a traditional Ayurvedic herbal cure for a variety of ills and is now widely used throughout the world as a high-blood pressure treatment. It is thought to improve the function of the cardiac muscle and to stabilise cholesterol levels, and it contains anti-oxidant properties.

* Basmati Rice Authentic basmati rice is grown in the foothills of the Himalayas and the Indian government has tried hard to protect the grain. A patent granted by the US Patent Office to a local company for new strains of rice similar to basmati was revoked after a legal battle with the Indian government.

* Turmeric It is grown mostly in Bengal and other areas of south-east Asia but, in addition to a curry spice, it can be used to heal wounds. In 1995, the US Patent Office granted a patent on its healing properties but Indian scientists protested and it was revoked.

* Brahmi This creeping herb is used in many Indian preparations and has gained global recognition for its ability to improve mental acuity and fight cognitive decay. It is thought that brahmi boosts the memory and has calming properties. In India, the plant is often used in salads and soups.

ayurvedic medicine is enthusiastically promoted by users including Cherie Blair, Madonna, Sting and Gwyneth Paltrow, ayurveda has become more of a brand than a treatment in the West. There are ayurvedic recipes and it embraces meditation, diet, yoga and herbal medicine, as well as featuring a lexicon that defines consciousness as the “dream state of the cosmic being”.

Offered in hotels, spas and retreats, as well as in the charitable Ayurvedic hospital in west London, its underlying principle is that the body and mind must be maintained in balance. Ayurvedic medicines are combinations of different herbs, tailor-made for each individual, which are given to correct imbalances that would otherwise lead to physical or psychological ill health.

In Britain, practitioners must undertake a three-year BSc degree course, followed by a 1,000-hour internship with an ayurvedic doctor, in order to be registered with the British Association of Ayurvedic Practitioners.

Some studies have suggested that certain herbal combinations may be effective for heart disease and rheumatoid arthritis. Triphala, the most popular ayurvedic remedy in India, made from the powdered and dried fruit of threeplants and taken as an aid to digestion, has been shown to slow cancer growth in mice….

It has long been a happy alternative for those reluctant to pop pills for depression. But the herbal extract St John’s Wort now has more than just cheerful converts to testify to its mood-lifting powers.

In what is billed as the most thorough study of the plant, scientists have found it is just as effective as Prozac at treating depression. It also had fewer side effects than many standard drugs used to help those battling despair.

Researchers compared the effects of the plant hypericum perforatum – popularly known as St John’s Wort – with placebos or a wide range of old and new anti-depressants, including those from the new generation of SSRI drugs, such as Prozac and Seroxat.

The findings could prompt more GPs to prescribe St John’s Wort.

In Germany, it is commonly given to children and teenagers.

Experts do not know exactly how the plant lifts depression, although most believe it probably works by keeping the chemical serotonin, which is linked to positive moods, in the brain for longer.

The study’s lead author, Dr Klaus Linde, from the Centre for Complementary Medicine in Munich, pooled data from 29 studies involving 5,489 patients with mild to moderately severe depression.

‘Overall, the St John’s Wort extracts tested in the trials were superior to placebo, similarly effective as standard anti-depressants, and had fewer side effects than standard anti-depressants,’ he said.

But he pointed out that St John’s Wort products available in health food shops and chemists differed greatly and some may be more effective than others.

‘Using a St John’s Wort extract might be justified but products on the market vary considerably, so these results only apply to the preparations tested,’ he explained.

The findings were published by the Cochrane Library, which specialises in systematic reviews of research studies.

France has taken a step to liberalise its highly restrictive herbal regulations by issuing two national decrees that should allow for greater access to botanical supplements.

One of the decrees will provide a distribution benefit by allowing a broad range of botanicals to be sold in non-pharmacy outlets such as supermarkets and health food stores for the first time.

The other recognises that botanical products have a somewhat unique status and can be sold as both food supplements and medicines.

Until now almost all botanical products except basic ‘spice rack’ herbs and a few others could only be sold in France as medicines in pharmacies.

Jacques Karlsson, the general secretary of the French food supplements trade association, Synadiet, said while the decrees were yet to become law as detail required further resolution, the French government move was significant.

Important step

“This is a very important step because it recognises herbal products for what they are rather than mis-grouping them all together as medicines and restricting their access,” Karlsson told NutraIngredients.com.

“But it is not yet written in law and we have not seen the final text so we wait for that.”

He said the Traditional Herbal Medicines Product Directive (THMPD) had not yet been transposed into the French legislature.

Most botanical products have been classified as medicines in France since the enactment of a 1941 law and hence restricted to pharmacies.

According to Patrick Coppens, the secretary-general of the Brussels-based industry group, the European Responsible Nutrition Alliance (ERNA), the French decrees were a step toward lifting “the pharma monopoly” that had existed in France for so long.

“The legislation is not complete but this is a move in the right direction,” he said. “With the application of the principles of mutual recognition there could soon be a lot more botanical products sold in non-pharmacy markets on the French market.”