By IANS,
Sydney : A passion fruit extract can cut down severe wheezing and coughing among asthma patients and help reduce blood pressure, a new study has found.
In a placebo-controlled, double-blind trial, only about a fifth of the people receiving purple passion fruit skin extracts had wheeze as a symptom, compared to nearly 80 percent of the placebo group.
In another trial, passion fruit treatment significantly decreased blood pressure.
Earlier, scientists had established the fruit’s bioactive properties.
“There are a lot of dietary supplements and natural products that are sold without much, or any, evidence of efficacy,” said Ronald Watson, who led the study.
“We now have two scientific publications indicating passion fruit has a beneficial effect on two very common but very different human diseases – hypertension and asthma – and that’s very exciting.”
“Many natural products like fruit and vegetables are known to have properties that have been shown to work just as well as pharmaceuticals, and that is appealing to people who don’t like the unpleasant side effects of pharmaceuticals,” said Watson.
Findings of the study have been published in the journal Nutrition Research and have caused quite a stir in the international medical and scientific communities.