Olive Leaf
So many products on how to control shingles with natural treatments flood the market that it sometimes seems impossible to sort out which ones are good and which ones are not. What I do is visit product sites, take a look at their claims, then go to PubMed and my various herbal medicine manuals and see what I can find about the activity of the ingredients. One such “miracle” product that I evaluated recently is olive leaf extract.
Folk Medicine
Olive leaf is listed among folk medicines for use as an antihypertensive (i.e., for lowering blood pressure) and diuretic. Very little good research is available regarding these claims. Nevertheless, modern supplement manufacturers have made quite a big deal of this application. The only study that I could find in support of it (Life Sciences 55: 1965-1971, 1994) showed that the active ingredient, oleuropein, decreased blood pressure and dilated arteries surrounding the heart. It was an animal study whereby the treatment was administered by injection.
The most significant reference in my library that evaluates olive leaf is the German Commission E Monographs on herbal medicines. This commission concludes that the effectiveness of olive leaf for the above claimed uses is not sufficient to support the claims.
Antiviral Studies
Oleuropein was also the subject of an antiviral survey of several plant ingredients (Chem. Pharm. Bull. 49: 1471-1473, 2001). The results of this study showed that none of the active ingredients from several plant species, including oleuropein, had any significant activity against HSV-1 (herpes simplex type 1) or Flu-A (influenza type A). Oleuropein, however, showed significant antiviral activities against RSV (respiratory syncytial virus), and Para 3 (parainfluenza type 3), both of which cause infections of the lower respiratory tract.
Recommendation
The good news is that olive leaf and its main active ingredient do, indeed, have an antiviral activity that will benefit you during the flu season. The bad news is that it has no activity against the only herpes virus that has been examined so far. Since all members of the herpes family are so similar in their responses to antivirals, this does not bode well for the use of olive leaf against shingles.
Dr. D
by Shingles is Not a Fully Contagious Disease
[...] Natural Shingles Treatment So many products on how to control shingles with natural treatments flood the market that it sometimes seems impossible to sort out which ones are good and which ones are not. [...]
by Facts About Shingles Treatment
[...] Olive Leaf Against Shingles It was an animal study whereby the treatment was administered by injection. The most significant reference in my library that evaluates olive leaf is the German Commission E Monographs on herbal medicines. [...]
by Dr. Dennis Clark
One of the big challenges of using animals studies is extrapolating their meaning for humans. As one of my colleagues once stated, “This a leap of faith equivalent to jumping over the Grand Canyon.” As a group, we scientists believe that we can isolate individual variables and imply cause and effect to their interactions. Lab animals and people are much more complicated than that, so we get huge statistical variations that we assign arbitrary confidences to. In the end, whether a particular herb or other treatment helps with shingles has to do as much with each person’s genetics and lifestyle as it does with the treatment itself.
Dr. D