Honey, Mud, Maggots, and other Medical Marvels

Honey, Mud, Maggots, and Other Medical Marvels:
the science behind folk remedies and Old Wives' tales
by Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein
Houghton Mifflin, 1997

Unfortunately, this book is out of print, but I highly recommend buying it through Bookfinder.com, Amazon.com, or anywhere else you can lay your hands on it.

I picked this book off my shelves yesterday to re-read. It is a well-written, intriguing, and thought-provoking book on folk remedies. These cures, some of them grotesque by today's standard, were scorned and scoffed by the medical profession for years. Ironically, that same medical profession is taking a new look at them and even, in some cases, embracing them.

The authors give the background and current medical understanding--and use--of a wide variety of treatments, including using maggots to treat gangrene and leeches in microsurgery, the antibiotic properties of honey for deep wounds, clay eating, and more. This volume is very readable and hard to put down. When I first read it, I was so intrigued that I began to do look further into some of the treatments it covers and learned that the authors were not exaggerating current usage by some in the medical field of these folk remedies. Today, with the increasing problem of antibiotic-resistant diseases, the alternative treatments offered in this book are even more worthwhile to consider.