What are some of the general health advantages honey can offer?
It's a challenging question to ask, depending on what it is that you're looking to treat. Honey has been used for many years – millennia – as a food source, but then also as a medicine.
I think we all grew up with grandparents that were like, "Oh yeah, have some tea with honey, and it'll help your cough." There's possibly some validity to that, and recently, there's been more literature (on other benefits of honey). Of course, from an allergy and immunology perspective, we see it through one lens. And there are formulations of medical-grade honey that are being utilized as pharmaceuticals for wound healing and things along those lines.
So, there are benefits to honey. There is ongoing research in the cardiovascular realm for improvement of various cardiovascular biomarkers, such as triglycerides and LDL and HDL, particularly if you're swapping it out for refined sugar as a food source.
Does eating locally produced honey offer any potential relief to allergy sufferers?
If you're in the environment to which you're consuming the honey, the question is: Are you then consuming the pollens that are in that honey and therefore modulating your immune response against those allergens? And the quick answer is no, it doesn't quite work that way. How wonderful would that be if it would be as simple as just eating some raw honey from the area in which you reside to desensitize to those allergens? But the dose of any kind of allergen that needs to be in there is not sufficient to stimulate any kind of immune response, or otherwise you'd be having an allergic reaction to it.
There's also the botanical side. A lot of the plants we are allergic to are anemophilous (wind-pollenated) – tree, grass and ragweed pollen are carried by the wind. Meanwhile, our honeybees go after high nectar-producing plants that have evolved to require insect interaction with their pollen and stamens for reproduction. And so, although these insects are in the environment and carry pollen, it's just incidental. You're just not getting the pollen in the sufficient dose from that immune response standpoint.
The mass-produced honey at supermarkets are filtered. Are there any potential health benefits for a consumer to buy less filtered, or raw, honey?
There was a study done in New England in the early 2000s that looked at unfiltered honey as a potential treatment for allergy sufferers. It was a randomized controlled study of two groups of patients. They gave one group typical treatments for rhinitis (hay fever) and rhinoconjunctivitis (inflammation affecting the nose and eyes), and the other group consumed a regular dose of unfiltered raw honey that was local to their area. And, unfortunately, there was no health benefit observed with that raw, unfiltered honey group.
When an allergy patient asks if they can eat honey as a possible treatment, my usual answer is, “By all means, unless it's something against your dietary recommendations, such as if you’re diabetic. And if you feel like it helps you, great.”
We have options that can certainly more robustly manage their allergic disease. We treat most allergies with nasal steroids, nasal antihistamines or oral antihistamines to block the allergic response. In some cases, where medications are not effective for the patient desires to take less medication, we can offer allergen immunotherapy (allergy shots). These shots are custom to the patient and modulate the patient’s immune system to be less sensitive to allergens. The upside is that the treatment response is often durable for many years after the shots have been complete. But we see people from all walks of life who have different cultural and societal desires, and so it's sometimes just meeting them where they want to go.
Is there any evidence that honey is helpful for coughs, especially for children?
Yes, there are some data that suggest that it can have some of these flavonoids and other types of components that act as a natural cough suppressant. There's a viscosity to it. Mixed with teas and warm beverages – those types of things – honey has been helpful for that. I would add that consumption of honey under age 1 year is not recommended due to the concern for botulism.
Does honey have antibacterial properties, and can it be applied as a treatment for wounds?
Yes, whether those are endogenous compounds like phenolic acids or even flavonoids that are in the honey. It also has a profound osmotic gradient – that is likely what helps with the wound healing as well. Part of it is antimicrobial as well.
Nothing will grow in honey because it's just so thick with sugar, and it's kind of that natural antiseptic in that sense. And so it's great in that application, but if you have cellulitis or something like that because you stepped on a nail, it's not necessarily going to turn that around.
Can honey go bad?
No. Growing up in central Kansas, a family friend had a big apiary, and part of their rent for putting their bees on our pastures was giving us honey. So, there were many years when they would have a glut of honey, and they’d give us 20, 30 pounds, and it would last for years and years. It doesn’t need to be refrigerated. It'll crystallize and turn into a solid form, but you just warm it up slowly and the honey turns back to liquid.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
