There’s no doubt: cold and flu season has started. People all around me are dropping like rain engulfed in the Ricola coated misery of throat scratching, tissue wiping, body aching illness. Even John Stewart, last week, seemed to be complaining of the same cold my wife is now getting over, which, I suppose, is indirectly good for him, since sick people seem to watch a lot more television. Thankfully, my wife has only missed one day of work and I credit this miracle to the constant vigilance I’ve been giving to her regimen of chinese herbal formulas.
However, there are sinister forces at work. My wife, as a school teacher, is constantly exposed to the most virulent petri dish of cold and flu the world has known: children. Even more worrying is that one of her colleagues was diagnosed with swine flu, aka H1N1 (insert suspenseful music here). As tissue and Tussin sales go up, swine flu seems to be held breathlessly on everyone’s lips. Using chinese herbal formulas to treat this is becoming more well known. It is not surprising that, within china, they are already beefing up their herb supply to treat the impending flu season. A recent article stated that they already had 2 million doses of herbs ready!
Even within the U.S., there are practitioners using these same herbs to treat swine flu and other flus not gifted with such elaborate names and aliases. As an enthusiastic herbalist, I find this exhilarating. Even more exciting would be to have these formulas better integrated into the mainstream health care system, which would, not only help alleviate symptoms, but reduce cost. Chinese Herbs are cheap.
So here’s my vision: a giant steaming cauldron full of herbs, twigs and berries, slowly stirred in the hospital lobby, or the school cafeteria, or the airport security check, with a cup full of decoction for everyone.
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