Is Essiac Tea an Alternative Treatment to Cure Cancer?

Looking for an alternative treatment to cure cancer becomes a mission of cancer patient especially who are fear of chemotherapy side effects. Essiac tea is one of the most popular alternative cancer treatments tried over the years. It has a strong word-of-mouth reputation with many testimonials claiming its ability to cure cancer.

Essiac tea was first popularized in Canada in the 1920s by a nurse named Renée Caisse. The original formula was based on an herbal tea developed by an Ojibwa Indian medicine man. Caisse heard about it from a woman who claimed that her breast cancer had been cured with an herbal brew prepared by an Objibwa healer.

In 1924, Caisse opened a clinic and began treating cancer patients with the herbal mixture. She treated thousands of patients with her version of the tea. Essiac Tea is named of Renée Caisse, with Essiac being her last name spelled backwards. Eventually before her death, Ciasse gave the four herb cancer cure formula to a Toronto manufacturer for testing and sales.

There are many variations of Essiac tea. The original four ingredients used by Caisse consist of burdock root, Indian rhubarb root, sheep sorrel, and slippery elm. Some other recipes of alternative treatment to cure cancer like Native Legend Tea, FlorEssence, Vitalitea, Tea of Life, and Herbal Essence contain additional herbs including watercress, blessed thistle, red clover, and kelp.

The sad fact about the efficiency to use Essiac tea in cancer cure is that Caisse never revealed the exact and precise formula she used to make her original Essiac tea during her lifetime. She had concern that a monopolistic medical organization would either try to discredit the formula and use it to earn huge profits. So no one knows the strength of Caisse’s tea or the frequency of dosage she recommended.

Currently, there is no scientific evidence to support ability of Essiac tea as alternative treatment for cancer cure to extend cancer patients’ life. According to the American Cancer Society’s website, some of the individual ingredients in the tea have shown some anti-cancer effects in laboratory tests. However, there is no scientific evidence supporting its use as an alternative cancer treatment for humans.

While the ACS has nothing firm to show that Essiac tea can help in reducing tumor or curing cancer, some research has shown that Essiac can cause nausea and vomiting, and FlorEssence has been reported to cause skin blemishes, frequent urination, increased bowel movements, swollen glands, slight headaches and flu-like symptoms. Hence, The FDA has not approved Essiac tea as alternative cancer treatments.

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