The healing powers of honey

5 December 2008
Honey's been around almost as long as humans; apparently it's the only food that doesn't spoil, it's full of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, and in rats it's shown to lower anxiety and curb memory loss.

Dr Lynne Chepulis has been studying honey for 15 years and after completing her PhD at Waikato, which looked at honey as an alternative to sucrose in diet, she decided to write a book on honey's healing powers.

"The old wives tales about the goodness of honey have been around forever, but I've come at it from a scientific point of view, testing the anecdotes. I can tell you that not all honeys are created equal but all of them - cheap and expensive - can have health giving properties," says Chepulis.

"The long-chain sugars called oligosaccharides, found in all honeys, are good for gut health, all honeys have fructose, which is better than other sugars for controlling blood-sugar levels and the anti-oxidants help fight free radical damage."

Chepulis is a nutrition scientist. She wrote her book Healing Honey over a six-month period while looking after a newborn baby. She secured a US publisher and the book can be bought online through http://www.brownwalker.com/book.php?method=ISBN&book=1599424851

Her PhD supervisor at Waikato was international honey authority Professor Peter Molan. He's worked with Chepulis at Waikato University's Honey Research Unit for almost a decade and says the book will be useful. "It'll let the public know the many ways in which honey can be of benefit to health, not only through its various therapeutic actions but also by it being a much healthier means of sweetening food and drink than ordinary sugar is," says Prof Molan. "It presents the evidence which has come from modern research in a style of writing that will be easily understood by the public."

Artist's Impression of the New Student Centre

SWEET AS: Dr Lynne Chepulis has written a book on honey.