french clay cures infections? staph aureus / MRSA

[Guest guest]

Minerals in French Clay Cure Deadly Drug-Resistant bacteria

Boulder, CO, USA - French clay that kills several kinds of

disease-causing bacteria is at the forefront of new research into

age-old, nearly forgotten, but surprisingly potent cures. Among the

malevolent bacteria that a French clay has been shown to fight is a

" flesh-eating " bug (M. ulcerans) on the rise in Africa and the germ

called MRSA, which was blamed for the recent deaths of two children in

Virginia and Mississippi.

" There are very compelling reports of clay treating infections, but

that's anecdotal evidence, not science, " said Lynda , an

associate research professor in the School of Earth and Space

Exploration at Arizona State University, Tempe. is

coordinating three teams of U.S. researchers (at ASU, USGS, and

SUNY-Buffalo) studying healing clays under a two-year, $440,000 grant

from the National Institutes of Health-National Center for

Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Her ASU colleague

Haydel is lending her expertise in clinical medicine to perform the

microbiological research.

For thousands of years, people have used clay to heal wounds, soothe

indigestion, and kill intestinal worms. Though the practice has

declined in modern times, the recent rise of drug-resistant germs has

scientists looking more closely at these ancient remedies to learn

exactly what they can do and how they do it.

" We're beginning to generate the first scientific evidence of why some

minerals might kill bacterial organisms and others might not, " said

.

In laboratory tests at ASU's Biodesign Institute, co-PI Haydel, an

assistant professor in the School of Life Sciences, showed that one

clay killed bacteria responsible for many human illnesses, including:

Staphylococcus aureus, methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA),

penicillin-resistant S. aureus (PRSA), and pathogenic Escherichia coli

(E. coli).

It also killed Mycobacterium ulcerans, a germ related to leprosy and

tuberculosis that causes the flesh-eating disease Buruli ulcer. This

effect was first described in 2002, by Line Brunet de Courssou, a

French humanitarian working in the Ivory Coast, Africa, who cured

Buruli ulcers with daily applications of French clay she knew from

childhood. Currently, advanced cases of Buruli ulcer can only be cured

by surgical excision or amputation.

The new medicinal clay research will be presented on Monday, 29

October 2007, at the Geological Society of America Annual Meeting in

Denver.

In the same session there will be a related presentation describing

the work 100 years ago of Julius Stumpf, a German physician and

scientist who used white clay from Germany to treat a deadly form of

Asian cholera; diphtheria; gangrene; ulcers of the tibia (a bone

between the knee and foot); and the skin disease eczema.

http://www.geosociety.org/news/pr/07-58.htm