For centuries, Chinese Medicine and Western folk medicine have used extracts from red clover as a diuretic, cough expectorant, and remedy for skin conditions like psoriasis. Now modern medicine claims that it can help reduce the symptoms of the menopause and ease prostate problems. And it could even help prevent cancer.



The reason is that red clover contains isoflavones. These are chemicals which act like weak oestrogens. This blocks some of the bad effects of naturally-occurring oestrogen, which can cause breast, prostate and colon cancer.

One of the isoflavones, known as ?geneistin? can revert breast and prostate cancer cells back to their pre-cancerous states. It can also delay the growth of new blood vessels in tumours.

This may explain the low rates of prostate cancer in Asia. They eat a lot of isoflavone-rich foods like red clover, soya, lentils, chickpeas and beans.

Red clover can also help reduce the sypmotomns of the menopause, such as night sweats and hot flushes. For instance, in Japan, another Asian country that loves its isoflavones, hot flushes are rarely reported.

Red Clover is available as a dried herb, and in tablets, capsules, and tinctures. To make a cup, pour boiling water over two teaspoonfuls of dried Red Clover flowers. Cover, then steep for another ten minutes.

Another cancer fighting weapon

The are two more natural cancer-fighting compounds you should be aware of. And both are found in the same fruit.

Resveratrol is an antioxidant found in high quantities in dark grapes, such as the muscadine. This fruit is also loaded with pterostilbene, which scientists have found could prevent the kind of cell damage associated with cancer-causing agents. It can also lower blood glucose levels, making it highly effective against diabetes.

So while you're enjoying your red clover tea, why not munch on some muscadine grapes, or other dark-skinned grapes? Or try this?

Avoid disease? AND vampires

Vampires hate garlic. As do people on first dates. Cancer cells aren't too keen on it either.

For hundreds of years, people have been using chopped up garlic to fight skin cancer. Make a poultice of garlic and castor oil, paste it onto your skin, and the tumour could shrivel and die in a matter of days.

It's all because of allicin, the chemical that gives garlic its flavor. Allicin, produced by a biochemical reaction between alliinase and alliin, is toxic to cancer cells.

Usually, when you chew garlic, the allicin is produced, then neutralised before it reaches the parts that need it. But Israeli researchers have found a way to get these two compounds to the site of a tumour seprately. Then, when they reach the cancer cells, the idea is that they'll combine, release allicin, and start to destroys the cells.

Clever stuff, but we'll have to wait for a bit of scientific progress first.

That said, many people still swear by garlic as a weapon against cancer. Even if you just eat it. And there's some evidence to back them up. In 2000, a team of researchers from the University of North Carolina found that people who eat raw or cooked garlic regularly cut their risk of stomach cancer by about a half compared with those who eat none.

Try blending up some raw broccoli, garlic juice, onions and ginger. Some experts say it's one of the most potent anti-cancer concoctions you can drink.

Sounds like it could blow away a hangover from 20 miles, too!