Garlic protection

Atomic absorption spectroscopy has been used to analyse the distribution of lead and cadmium in different mouse organs including liver, kidney, spleen, heart, and blood, after treatment with different aqueous concentrations of garlic. The results suggest that garlic could help protect against organ damage caused by these toxic heavy metals.

Exposure to lead can affect the central nervous system and affect learning ability and growth. It is ubiquitous in the environment and can be absorbed in the human body by inhalation and ingestion from a variety of sources such as contaminated water, soil, food, lead-containing products such as paint and from vehicle exhausts in areas where tetra-ethyl lead is still used as engine an anti-knocking agent. Garlic, Allium sativum has been variously labelled as a panacea with purported benefits to the cardiovascular system by way of reducing blood pressure and lowering cholesterol levels.

Now, Adnan Massadeh of the Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Pharmacognosy, at  Jordan University of Science and Technology, in Irbid, Jordan and colleagues have demonstrated the potential of garlic as an antidote to cadmium and lead toxicity. The team analysed the effect of different aqueous concentrations of garlic at 12.5 to 100 mg per litre. They found that lead concentrations were reduced by up to half in liver, kidney, heart, and spleen by almost two thirds in blood. Garlic also reduced cadmium levels by between 70 and 96 percent.

The net result was that immunosupressesion caused by dosing with a cadmium-lead mixture was reversed by up to 90.7 at the highest dose of garlic extract. Massadeh and colleagues have previously investigated heavy metal contamination of soil, sediment, road dust, and water as well as lead levels in local and imported sheep meat using AAS and have found concentrations to exceed acceptable levels in many cases. This makes finding a simple and perhaps natural approach to reducing the toxic effects of heavy metals even more poignant.