Coconut oil proves a powerful cure-all

Coconut oil proves a powerful cure-all

Slamet Susanto, The Jakarta Post, Yogyakarta

While most babies his age were crawling around and getting
frequent cuddles from their parents and relatives, 14-month-old
Farhan had to bear the excruciating itch of eczema.

The condition of Farhan, whose rash covered almost his entire
body, disturbed his uncle, Muhammad Amien, who tried to think of
a way to help his beloved nephew.

Muhammad, a resident of Karanganyar regency in Central Java,
was frustrated as the family had tried many ways to help the
baby.

"It was very depressing to see Farhan always scratching the
eczema, which eventually developed into scabs, while he could
only cry as he could not bear the itchy feeling," Muhammad said.

Last month, when Muhammad was in Yogyakarta he chanced on an
article in a local newspaper describing the curative properties
of minyak kelapa, or coconut oil. The article said the refined
oil was being produced by Gadjah Mada University's School of
Mathematics and Natural Sciences and had been found useful in
treating a series of ailments, including heart disease,
hepatitis, and eczema. Curious, he went to the campus and bought
four bottles of it.

"Arriving at home, I rubbed the oil on to Farhan's body and
gave him some to drink. To our surprise, only two days later the
eczema was drying. It's now completely cured," Muhammad said.

Researcher Bambang Setiadi, who developed the production of
the coconut oil and conducted research into its healing powers,
said that coconut oil did have many healing capacities, due to
the high degree of laurat acid content, which was some 49 to 50
percent.

Laurat acid was similar to the acid in breast milk that could
help prevent several diseases and was capable of killing off
viruses, bacteria, and fungi, he said. Like breast milk acid, the
acid in the oil was a good treatment for premature babies with
weak immune systems. It was also a good treatment for varicose
veins and prostate problems.

Quoting a book entitled The Healing Miracles of Coconut Oil
written by nutritionist Jon J. Kabara of the U.S., Bambang said
the laurat acid content in coconut oil could also kill numerous
bacteria including listeria monocylogenes, helicobacter phlori,
streptococcus aglalactiae and be used to combat viruses such as
HIV, hepatitis C, and herpes viridae.

However, due to unfair business competition during the New
Order era involving palm oil tycoon ..... , who wanted his
product to dominate the country's cooking oil market, the
popularity of coconut oil in the country decreased.

A campaign against coconut oil said it was less hygienic and
contained higher levels of saturated fat, which caused high
cholesterol in human blood. As a result, people preferred to
consume palm oil than the healing substance-rich coconut oil.

But while coconut oil does contain a high content of saturated
fat, Bambang said it was of a short-chain chemical structure
(struktur kimia rantai pendek) that would not cause large
deposits of fat in the human body. In fact, the oil was capable
of quickly converting fat into energy, explaining why it was also
good for dieting, and was not thus easily detected, leading to
its sometime use as a doping agent.

"The fat (in the oil) is completely different from animal
fats, which have a long-chain chemical structure and are
dangerous for human health," Bambang said, adding that palm oil,
similarly, contained alpha carotene that could accelerate the
growth of cancer cells in the human body.

It was also because of its capability of burning fat that this
year the oil was tested on 15 patients suffering from coronary
heart disease in Jakarta, who had been ordered by their doctors
to undergo heart bypass surgery. For three consecutive weeks they
drank 5 cc of coconut oil, three times a day. By the end of the
test, 12 of the participating patients had improved sufficiently
that they did not need the surgery.

This year, coconut oil has also been tested on patients with
hepatitis C. After taking the oil for three consecutive weeks,
laboratory tests revealed the proliferation of the hepatitis C
virus was down by 70 percent than before they took the oil.

"We are now developing it to treat patients with HIV/AIDS,"
Bambang said. Efforts to use coconut oil to treat human diseases
were started last year after he found an article about its
healing properties on the Internet written by Kabara, he said.

Research into the oil here, Bambang said, had been going on
since 1985. However, it was not for medical purposes but to look
for a way to produce a coconut cooking oil that would last
longer. Traditional coconut oil production, which involved
heating it meant the product would go rancid quickly.

After a series of different studies, the university finally
succeeded in producing clear, rancid-proof coconut oil. So clear
is the oil that it looks like water, although it feels greasy
when touched.

The unlike the research, the refining technology is simple,
the oil is refined by mixing the correct amount of the already-
refined oil into coconut milk, stirring it thoroughly and evenly,
and leaving it for about six to seven hours.

"The oil will separate itself from the other substances in the
coconut milk and can last for nine years without going off," he
said.

Presently, by employing more than 400 people, split into about
20 small factories in the Galur sub-district, Kulonprogo, the
school is able to process about 4,500 fresh coconuts a day and
produces some 4,000 bottles of coconut oil, each containing about
100 cc of oil.

"It is of course still far below the demand. That's why we are
currently training new workers in some coconut plantation centers
in the country, including Riau," Bambang said.