Study: Most drugs produced in China are fake
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
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The growing popularity of medical products based on the "traditional" Chinese pharmacopoeia (primarily called "pills, tablets and powders, invented by Chinese alchemists relatively recently) causes considerable concern for doctors, and not only in Western states, but also in our country this suspicious pharmaceutical product.
The researchers compared what is written on the packaging of medical products of "traditional" Chinese medicine, with their contents.
Despite the huge funds associated with traditional Chinese medicine (we are talking here about the amount of about billion dollars a year), no one can say for certain that it is still being sold and bought. It is obvious that the composition is registered on cans and boxes, but when the experts made an attempt to study what the miraculous drugs consist of, they were surprised: the labels on the packaging very poorly reflected the actual composition of medical preparations.
Earlier, attempts have already been made to study the means of alternative Chinese medicine about unfamiliar components and potentially poisonous substances. But almost always they ended with the conclusion that "there is something there", without any reliable specifics. In most cases, this was due to imperfect equipment and methods of analysis. This time, scientists from the Murdoch Institute (Australia) set about this task, armed with the latest scientific technology. For example, in their arsenal were DNA sequencers, which were previously used in the species analysis of intestinal microflora; These devices allow you to read a grand number of heterogeneous DNA.
The researchers studied DNA from 15 medicines of traditional Chinese medicine, which are freely available, including powders, pills, therapeutic teas. In total, about 49 thousand fragments of the genetic code were analyzed; 68 plant species were identified.
As it turned out, the Chinese tea for weight loss, instead of the concentrate of staphania, a tropical plant of the genus of moonseous, includes an extract of aristolochia - a plant of the genus Kirkazonov, a woody liane that looks similar to stekhanii, but is related to plants of a completely different category. Aristocholic acid, which is part of this extract, is considered to be the most powerful oncogene for many years, which, as it turned out, caused a local epidemic of nephropathy and bladder cancer among the population of the Balkans, which for a long time remained a mystery for medical workers (as it turned out, the seeds of Aristophilia fell into flour , from which they baked bread).
At the moment, aristocholic acid is officially classified as category I oncogenes, and the addition of concentrates to the medicines and food additives obtained from it is strictly prohibited, even by Chinese authorities.
Perhaps, it is this unnamed component that explains the high incidence of kidney and bladder cancer in Taiwan?
The elderly Taiwanese, who suffer from kidney cancer, used medicines with aristolochia long before its official ban in 2003. Although, as demonstrated by DNA analysis of Chinese "classical" substances, made by experts from the Institute of Perth (Australia), Chinese pharmacists continue to use unsafe plants. So, 4 of the 15 drugs studied, in other words practically a quarter, contained the hoof concentrate (Asarum) - the next representative of the dangerous kind of Kirkzon. Preparations that contain this oncogene are designed to remove inflammatory phenomena in the respiratory tract, and also to treat pain in the teeth and bronchial asthma, that is, not exotic, but absolutely popular diseases.
In the samples, the presence of aristolochia DNA was traditionally accompanied by the presence of other toxins. Among the other "secret" components were ginseng, soybean and nutty species, which potentially have all the chances to provoke an allergy.
As for animals, here medicines abounded in the DNA of the Red Book species, such as the saiga antelope (on the verge of destruction) or the Himalayan bear. Half of the preparations contained DNA immediately from the whole set of animals, 3/4 of which were not mentioned on the package. It is interesting that the manufacturers did not mention not only rare and lost species, which are not allowed to be hunted; "Behind the scenes", among other things, were ordinary Asian buffaloes, cows and goats. According to the scientists, it seems that manufacturers simply mixed everything that came to hand.
Concerning the Red Data Book species, it has long been known that almost all of them are exterminated in order to compose "miraculous potions". However, it seems that not only the parts of the bodies of saigas and rare bears, but also the horns and hooves of simple cows and goats, have a magical, healing power.
It should be noted that the obtained data do not at all call into question traditional Chinese medicine. Apparently, the Chinese could not resist the desire to forge their own medicine. So it would be more accurate to say about the threat of pseudo-Chinese medicine. True, it is not entirely clear what to do in this situation to an ordinary buyer: not everyone in the house has the most modern DNA-analyzing unit
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