Member of the Aristolochia genusWIKIMEDIA, BOGDANPlants of the Aristolochia genus have for centuries been used in Chinese herbal remedies, but they contain a naturally carcinogenic compound that causes mutations in the cells of people who consume them, according to two studies published in Science Translational Medicine today (August 7). The papers reveal that the compound, called aristolochic acid, causes more mutations than two of the best-known environmental carcinogens: tobacco smoke and UV light.
“A lot of people in the lay public assume that if something is herbal or natural that it is necessarily healthy,” said Marc Ladanyi, an investigator in the human oncology and pathogenesis program at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York who was not involved in the studies. “But this work very clearly shows that this natural plant product is extremely genotoxic and carcinogenic.”
Despite the long history of Aristolochia use in herbal remedies, evidence of the plants’ inherent danger emerged only recently. In the early 1990s, women who had received Aristolochia treatments at a weight loss clinic in Belgium developed kidney problems that progressed to renal failure and, in later years, to abnormal growths in their upper urinary tracts. More recently, Aristolochia contamination of ...
