🌿 Folk Prescriptions

Despite rising living standards, breast cancer continues to haunt women like an inescapable nightmare. Traditionally, Chinese women have been accustomed to supplementing with ginseng and angelica—but unknowingly, this may actually harm their health.
Recently, Australian medical researchers discovered that ginseng and angelica can trigger breast cancer cell growth. Consequently, Australian TCM practitioners warn women to use these two herbs cautiously.
A report published in the *Australian Doctor* journal claims that ginseng and angelica have strong catalytic effects on female breast cancer cells. The report states that in recent years, natural therapies popular in Western countries often use ginseng and angelica to relieve menopausal symptoms—yet these herbs can promote cancer cell growth by 27-fold and 16-fold, respectively.
Ginseng Promotes Cancer Growth by 27 Times
Professor Xue Changli, Head of the TCM Department at Melbourne Royal Institute of Technology, believes that while research on breast cancer and traditional Chinese medicine is still in its early stages, caution is always wise: “Medicines, whether TCM or Western, have side effects—this is the essence of ‘all medicines have three parts poison.’ For patients with breast cancer or other conditions, any self-administered TCM supplements during treatment should be disclosed to both Western and TCM doctors.”
Yet he also stresses that people need not panic. To date, ginseng and angelica remain listed on the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration’s approved list of safe TCMs. Current findings are not definitive conclusions. Experimental results so far cannot confirm that ginseng and angelica definitively trigger cancer cell proliferation—especially breast cancer cell growth.