The tonic for good health
A major study has found that people who take the miracle drug regularly reduce their risk of developing FIVE different types of cancer
IF EVER a form of medication deserved the term “wonder drug” it’s aspirin. Since it first went on sale in 1899 it is estimated to have been taken by 100 billion people and is included in the World Health Organisation’s list of essential medicines needed in a basic health system.
And it’s not hard to see why. The humble pill, which can cost as little as 2p per dose, has been credited with staving off cancer, reducing the risk of heart attack, lowering the chances of suffering a stroke and delaying the onset of dementia.
This week its fortunes were given yet another shot in the arm with the publication of a major study which found that popping an aspirin a day can halve our risk of developing cancer of the liver or oesophagus.
The research by the Chinese University of Hong Kong – which drew on results from more that 600,000 people – also discovered that an 80mg daily dose of aspirin cut the risk of developing stomach, lung, pancreas and bowel cancer by 38, 35, 34 and 24 per cent respectively.
Its results showed that long-term use of the drug, which works by blocking inflammation in the body, has a smaller but significant effect on decreasing our chances of contracting prostate cancer and leukaemia.
Here we present a guide to the fascinating history of a medical miracle… THE active ingredient that gives aspirin its anti-inflammatory properties is called salicin. In nature it occurs in the bark of the willow tree and the Sumerians – an early civilisation that occupied what is modernday southern Iraq – and the ancient Egyptians were the first to use it for medical purposes as long ago as 3,000BC.
The Ebers papyrus, an ancient Egyptian medical text, refers to willow as a painreliever for non-specific aches and pains. BY 400BC Hippocrates – the Greek physician who became known as the “Father of Medicine” – was serving willow leaf tea to pregnant women to ease the pain of childbirth.
He was the man who laid out a system of medical ethics in what is known as the Hippocratic Oath, a variant of which is still sworn by newly qualified doctors. THE first recorded use of the willow remedy in the UK came in 1763 when the Reverend Edward Stone of Chipping Norton near Oxford gave powdered willow bark to 50 of his parishioners who were suffering from rheumatic fever. He later described his findings in a letter to the Royal Society of London. JOSEPH BUCHNER, professor of pharmacy at Munich University in Germany, became the first scientist to succeed in extracting the active ingredient from willow in 1828.
He produced bitter-tasting yellow crystals to which he gave the name salicin. Ten years later salicin was also found in a flower called meadowsweet. FRENCH chemist Charles Frédéric Gerhardt took Buchner’s work one step further in 1853 by synthesising salicyclic acid. Unfortunately it was found to irritate the gut. IN 1897 Felix Hoffmann, a chemist with German pharmaceutical giant Bayer, found that adding a chemical acetyl group to salicylic acid ORIGIN: The bark of willow trees reduced its irritant properties and Bayer patented the process. TWO years later Bayer gave its invention the marketing name Aspirin. The letter “A” stands for acetyl, “spir” is derived from the plant known as Spiraea ulmaria (meadowsweet), which yields salicin, and “in” was a common suffix used for drugs. WHEN war broke out in 1914 Bayer still held the patent to the drug and there was plotting on both sides to keep making it.
But to the victor the spoils: after Germany lost the First World War Bayer was forced to give up its trademark as part of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. It bought back the rights to Bayer Aspirin and other rights in 1994 for $1 billion. THE origins of aspirin got mired in controversy in 1949 when a German Jew named Arthur Eichengrün claimed that he had directed Felix Hoffmann’s work.
When Hoffmann first claimed credit for its creation in 1934, in an encyclopaedia, the Nazis had just come to power and Eichengrün lived in fear of his life. He spent more than a year in a concentration camp during the war and it was not until 1949 that he managed to publish his own claim for recognition – and died less than a month later. Some later academics are more accepting of his claim but Bayer still rejects it. IN 1950 aspirin was acknowledged as being the world’s biggestselling drug by the Guinness Book Of World Records. WHEN hyperinflation hit South America towards the end of the last century, money became almost worthless and aspirin was used as currency. ENGLISH scientist Professor Sir John Vane and two Swedish colleagues won the Nobel prize in 1982 for discovering the role aspirin can play in preventing the clotting that causes heart attacks and strokes. DIABETICS are frequently encouraged to take aspirin as their condition often leads to impaired blood circulation which can result in blindness, coronary artery disease, stroke and kidney failure. MEDICAL applications are not the only uses for aspirin. If you want cut flowers to last longer drop an aspirin into the vase – the salicylic acid helps the plants’ defence systems. And if you get sweat stains on your clothes apply a paste of crushed aspirin and water to the stain, leave to dry then wash as usual.