In a newly released study, Estonians are noted for their fondness for medicinal herbs, as evidenced by their consumption patterns and the variety of products found in pharmacies. The endurance of folk medicine in Estonia may have been influenced by the Soviet period.
According to wholesale data, Estonians buy an average of 650 000 packets, or 20 tonnes, of herbal preparations a year from pharmacies. Around 80 per cent of these come from Estonia and a fifth are imported. Altogether, Estonian farms produce about 14 tonnes of herbs and medicines based on them per year.
On average, an Estonian consumes ten grams of herbal preparations a year and drinks 20 cups of herbal tea a year. For every ten over-the-counter medicines, an Estonian buys one packet of herbal preparation, such as flower tea, dried leaves, etc. Of the medicinal herbs, Estonians prefer chamomile, flaxseed, bitter ginger, cumin and Iceland mugwort.
A total of 80 single-herb products and 145 herbal mixtures are available in Estonia. “It is fair to say that we buy a lot of herbal medicines and consequently use them. Unfortunately, there are no comparative studies comparing our habits with those of, for example, Latvians, Lithuanians, Finns, Poles or French,” Ain Raal, professor of pharmacognosy at the University of Tartu and one of the authors of the study, told ERR.
However, he says, it is worth noting that herbs are widely available in Estonian pharmacies. Pharmacists and pharmacists here also have scientific information about them. This may not be the case in other countries.
“Drawing attention to such a thing may sound strange for Estonians, because of course medicinal herbs must be available for us in pharmacies, where else?”If we take Germany, for example, which has a long tradition of herbal medicine, then medicinal herbs are by no means available in every pharmacy there, but there are specialised pharmacies,” he added.
According to the survey, Estonian residents mainly used various herbal mixtures to improve their general mood and mood – 27 percent. In addition, 17 per cent of those surveyed use them to relieve cold symptoms, 12 per cent to invigorate the body, 11 per cent to relieve stress and improve sleep quality, and seven per cent to relieve minor digestive problems.
The most popular herbal preparations are dried chamomile blossoms, mint leaves, lime blossoms, fennel and calendula blossoms. Around 88 percent of respondents use herbal medicines occasionally and 31 percent weekly.
Estonian still strongly believes in folk medicine.
Ain Raal believes that folk medicine in Estonia was kept alive by the Soviet era, when the development of industrial medicines lagged behind the Western world. “In the Soviet Union, medicinal herbs were recognised as a means of invigorating health. Perhaps the fact that herbal remedies were available in pharmacies throughout the Soviet period helped to keep this tradition alive,” he argues.
“If we go back to the 1940s, for example, the neighbouring country of Finland was developing according to the logic of the free world. There, industrial preparations took over and medicinal plants were gradually abandoned by pharmacies,” the professor said.
This, he says, does not necessarily mean that the use of herbal medicine is something primitive or outdated. “If we can and do solve situations with herbal remedies, which generally also have very low risks, why should we prefer remedies that are much more expensive and have a higher risk of side effects?” he said.
Although not all the herbs preferred by Estonians have been proven in human trials, Raal says that not all of them need extensive research. “We all know that lime blossoms make you sweat and therefore reduce high fevers. What clinical trials are needed here?” Raal gave an example.
“When we think about what is the criterion of truth for a medicinal product, it is clinical trials, or human trials. Certainly not all medicinal plants have been clinically tested. Now, if we take some specific examples of plants, for example chamomile, it has been quite well studied and not only animal studies have been done with chamomile, but also clinical studies,” Raal pointed out.
However, he noted that the effects of chamomile are not 100 percent scientifically proven, which would allow its effects to be considered fully established. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) considers chamomile to be a traditionally used medicinal product, generally evidence-based and safe to use.
“Another example is palderjana, which is known to have a calming and sleep-promoting effect on the central nervous system. Human trials have shown that this is completely evidence-based. So it ultimately depends on the plant: you can’t generalise one way or the other. We can’t say that they are all evidence-based, but evidence-based use is still inherent to medicines,” Raal concluded.