Thuja
Thuja occidentalis
“The antiviral effect of the drug is attributed to many reasons ... Proliferation of T cells caused by polysaccharides (esp. CD-4 and T-helper/inducer-cells) and an increase in the production of interleukin-2 has been demonstrated.”
- PDR for Herbal Medicines, 2nd edition
Bartram writes that it was used as “a substitute for children to whom vaccination is inadvisable” and a paragraph later quotes Dr. C. M. F. von Boenninghausen (1785-1864) as saying “I found Thuja preventative and curative in an epidemic of smallpox, and prevents pitting,” using it for “the vaccinal taint - that profound, often long-lasting morbid constitutional state engendered by the vaccine virus...”
- Encyclopedia of Herbal Medicine
Ellingwood provides four full pages on thuja. By comparison, the average entry for an herb is half to a full page. He writes that "no extended systematic study of the physiological action or specific therapeutic application of this agent has been made. ... Thuja certainly exercises a direct influence upon the glandular structures and function. In what manner this influence is exercised is unknown, but in any disease that involves the gland, this remedy must be considered, and if there are no contraindications it can be tried, and in many cases as with the ductless glands, it seems to act in a direct manner. Thuja is directly indicated, first, as a peculiar alterative, in improving diathetic conditions of the blood. Again, it acts directly upon abnormal growths - perversions, such as peculiar conditions of the cell structure of the skin, and other external structures." The amount of information in Ellingwood's text which is not included in this monograph is very long and Master Herbalist students are asked to read the full entry in American Materia Medica.
- American Materia Medica