A 1,200-year-old Anglo-Saxon remedy called Bald’s Eye Salve has proven “astonishingly” effective in battling the MRSA superbug, which kills more than 5,000 people a year in the US.
The potion, composed of garlic, onion or leeks, wine, and ox bile, kills up to 90 per cent of antibiotic-resistant Staphylococcus aureus bacteria in mice, according to scientists at the University of Nottingham.
The Mediaeval treatment was rediscovered by Christina Lee,
an associate professor who specialises in disease and disability in the
Anglo-Saxon and Viking eras, who translated it from old English.
The recipe, including detailed instructions on how long to chill the ingredients (nine days at 4C), was found in Bald’s Leechbook, a leather-bound medical textbook from the 9th Century held in the British Library. Microbiologists recreated Bald’s Eye Salve as faithfully as possible,
even using a wine from a historic vineyard near Glastonbury, and tested
it both in vitro and on wounds in mice.
“We thought that Bald’s eye salve might show a small amount
of antibiotic activity, because each of the ingredients has been shown
by other researchers to have some effect on bacteria in the lab,” said
microbiologist Freya Harrison. “We were absolutely blown away by just
how effective the combination of ingredients was.“We tested it in difficult conditions too,” Dr Harrison stated.
“We let our artificial ‘infections’ grow into dense, mature populations
called ‘biofilms’, where the individual cells bunch together and make a
sticky coating that makes it hard for antibiotics to reach them. But
unlike many modern antibiotics, Bald’s eye salve has the power to breach
these defences.”
A global hunt for new weapons against antibiotic-resistant infections was launched last year, spearheaded by British Prime Minister David Cameron.
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