Few would argue that modern medicine has made enormous progress in helping us live longer and healthier lives, but there are costs involved. One of these is the cost to the environment of the by-products of the chemicals industry and the packaging and transport of the medicines themselves. Here are some steps you can take to help reduce “ecological disease”.
Going herbal
If you’re not growing your own herbs or plant medicines, then purchasing herbal remedies or complementary medicines that are grown locally and packaged in recycled containers are a better bet than an imported product, because they do less harm to the environment.
“Complementary medicines are environmentally friendly if they’re sourced from properly cultivated organic stock and not harvested from their wild habitats, as that would disrupt the ecosystem and deplete natural resources,” says Cape Town-based Dr Arien van der Merwe, a health writer and practitioner.
Green medicine box
So now that you’re willing to try natural remedies, where to start? Allan Sakinofsky, a pharmacist and “natural health” retailer in Cape Town, suggests you consider the following products, which are available from plants or from pharmacies and health shops, and are good for treating common ailments:
Aloe vera. Have this plant handy for wounds and all types of burns, including sunburn. Slice a leaf and apply.
Arnica. Used for bruises, sprains and sore muscles, this remedy is available in a cream or ointment, or can be given as a compress or taken orally.
Calendula. This herbal remedy is anti-inflammatory, astringent and antiseptic, and it inhibits bleeding.
Camomile. This herb is an anti-inflammatory as well as a digestive aid. Drink it as a tea or apply directly to the skin for rashes.
Echinacea. This immune booster is good to take when you’re run down or to help prevent and fight colds and flu.
Lavender oil. Helps heal burns or stings when mixed with a little aqueous cream. It’s also known to calm frazzled nerves, so add a few drops to your bath water.
Rescue remedy. This flower remedy can help ease feelings of shock or panic following a trauma.
St John’s wort. A herb most commonly used to help treat depression, it can also be taken after head injuries or puncture wounds. But it decreases the efficacy of the contraceptive pill.
Tea tree oil. Mix one part tea tree oil with 10 parts water and use to wash wounds — this is a natural antiseptic.
Recycling modern medicine
If you find herbal and complementary medicine hard pills to swallow, then you can still do the Earth some good by considering some of the following issues.
First is the tricky problem of how to dispose of drugs safely. For years, we’ve flushed expired medication down the toilet, thinking it safer to do this than to throw it in the bin where it might be found by children or pets. Unfortunately most sewage treatment plants aren’t designed to filter these drugs out, so the active ingredients make their way into our rivers, dams and drinking water.
Expired medication should be returned to suppliers instead. Pharmacies, including the big chains, take back expired medicines, which are in turn collected by medical-waste companies that dispose of them in a responsible manner, usually by burning.
Recycling has its own problems, though. Before you drop off your old meds at the pharmacy, where they will be whisked away, remember that there are financial costs involved in recycling.
“The disposal of pharmaceutical waste has to be handled with great care,” says Karin Mathews, manager of BCL Medical Waste in Cape Town, which regularly collects medical waste from pharmacies. “Any pharmaceuticals that have expired or have been damaged have to be destroyed, either via high temperature incineration or encapsulation — that is, taken to designated, licensed landfill sites.”
Both these processes are expensive and force a company to wade through red tape.
Packaging is another major culprit in environmental hurt. Where possible, consider eco-friendly options, including reusable packaging such as glass bottles and recyclable packaging such as glass, card and paper. Biodegradable plastics are more environmentally friendly than the more traditional PVC plastics.
Certain international homeopathic companies have a recycleable logo on their containers, so look out for these.
If it’s at all possible, recycle it.
This is an edited excerpt from the July 2008 issue of Real Simple magazine.