Natural herbal remedy for Dengue emerges from the food forests of Bali
As TripAdvisor announces that Bali is the Number 1 Tourist Destination in the World, a traditional medicinal plant emerges to fight Dengue, the most feared downside to this island paradise.
Dengue Fever affects more than 390 million people every year, and the World Health Organisation advises that 40% of the world population is at risk of infection with this debillitating and sometimes fatal disease.
Dengue occurs year-round in Indonesia, reaching peak transmission in the rainy season with outbreaks infecting hundreds of thousands.
Many hundreds of people die every year of Dengue, particularly the severe hemorrhagic form, and every year the tourist hospitals in Bali fill to the brim with holiday makers and expats who have fallen ill to this mosquito borne disease.
We live in an age where tropical diseases like Dengue and Zika are spreading…
According to the World Health Organization, rising temperatures and higher rainfall caused by climate change will see the number of mosquitoes increasing in cooler areas where there is little resistance or knowledge of the diseases they carry.
Authorities in every country affected by mosquito borne flaviviruses are working to stop the spread of this debilitating and sometimes fatal disease, including through mosquito fogging.
There is an even bigger concern that Zika could arrive in areas already struggling to control the mosquito-borne diseases Dengue and Chikungunya. Billions of dollars are being invested by governments and pharmaceutical companies around the world to rapidly develop vaccines, mosquito limiting mechanisms including GMO mosquitos, and synthetic drugs to fight Dengue and the new threat of Zika.
“We must look to nature to solve modern day epidemics” said retired Australian Microbiologist Rhonda Sorensen, who has long been an advocate for sustainable farming and rural communities. “The same rainforests where dengue probably originated can provide solutions in the form of the traditional herbal knowledge of this region.”
Indonesians have an ancient culture of herbal medicine called Jamu, a tradition steeped in healing that is just now becoming known to the western world. Some of this traditional knowledge now has peer-reviewed scientific back-up from independent University studies.
Temu kunchi, is a rare medicinal ginger that has been used for centuries throughout Asia as a food spice, a medicinal plant and for spiritual purposes. Under the botanical name Boesenbergia rotunda (previously Kaempferia pandurata), it has now been studied and researched extensively, and identified as an important anti-dengue herbal plant.
The increasing spread and severity of the dengue and Zika viruses, the lack of any treatment medicines, emphasizes the importance of drug discovery strategies to identify antiviral drug leads. Components of Boesenbergia rotunda (Kunchi) are currently being investigated for their ability to block the flavivirus replication NS2B/NS3 protease pathways for possible development into potent synthetic drugs.
A group of entrepreneurial farmers in the Petang region in the geographic center of Bali, well off the tourist trails are growing this ginger called Temu kunchi, with the common names of Chinese Keys or Fingerroot. They have surveyed and found high quality areas of this ginger in the food forests surrounding the sacred mountain Pucak Tedung, and have spent a year planting and quietly waiting for it to grow.
Gede Yasa and his team at Kunchi Bali have started harvesting and now bottling the raw juice in shot size bottles on the farm. They have called these shots of the raw juice “Kunchi, Key to Life”, and the product has been making introductory appearances at the local organic farmers’ markets in Ubud, the must visit spiritual and cultural tourist center of Bali.
Customers are really surprised to find that there is a natural ginger that fights Dengue, as little has been written about it. Temu kunci is a part of the ginger family and very similar to Turmeric. It is a true superfood with a broad range of bioactive flavonoids and chalcones that have anti-cancer, anti-photoaging, anti-obesity, anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory effects, in addition to the anti-viral.
“Kunchi is good for your body, and tastes good too. I drink two everyday” says Kunchi founder Gede Yasa.
Yasa says that more farmers are needed to organically grow Temu kunci and the Kunchi Bali team are offering a fair price to famers to encourage them to grow high quality organic produce. Kunchi Bali hopes to educate the farmers on how to grow the Temu kunci as part of the organic permaculture food forest systems that are traditional in this area. They have already had one Organic Farmers Field Day in January, where 26 local farmers signed up to participate in growing this medicinal rhizome.
Agung Weda from Organikulture, and the Junior Chamber International Young Farmers Club was the guest speaker at the field day, held at the Kunchi Bali Farm. “The Petang area will be known as the centre of organic Temu kunci production in Bali” says Weda.
Kunchi Bali is launching a crowdfunding campaign through Indiegogo this week to continue developing this natural herbal product. The crowdfunding will enable Kunchi Bali to scale up production and teach the farmers to keep it organic. Kunchi product development to export standards will make it available to help improve the health of all the people. The crowd funding will also go towards specific research on whether this medicinal plant will effect Zika, which is a very close relative of Dengue.
If you want to help make this happen, then please support this Kunchi Bali Indiegogo campaign and help us get this natural herbal Jamu out to the world.
Hippocrates. the Father of modern medicine, said almost 2500 years ago “Leave your drugs in the chemist's pot if you can heal the patient with food."