1,000-year-old Anglo-Saxon potion kills MSRA superbug

Well those old Saxons knew what they were doing.



http://ift.tt/1DsiGNJ

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The 10th-century "eyesalve" remedy was discovered at the British Library in a leather-bound volume of Bald's Leechbook, widely considered to be one of the earliest known medical textbooks.

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The recipe calls for two species of Allium (garlic and onion or leek), wine and oxgall (bile from a cow's stomach) to be brewed in a brass vessel.

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The researchers then tested their recipe on cultures of MRSA, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, a type of staph bacterium that does not respond to commonly used antibiotic treatments. The scientists weren't holding out much hope that it would work -- but they were astonished by the lab results. "What we found was very interesting -- we found that Bald's eyesalve is incredibly potent as an anti-Staphylococcal antibiotic in this context," Harrison said. "We were going from a mature, established population of a few billion cells, all stuck together in this highly protected biofilm coat, to really just a few thousand cells left alive. This is a massive, massive killing ability."

1,000-year-old Anglo-Saxon potion kills MSRA superbug