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| inflammatory herb that protects against intestinal parasites and venomous bites. One of the best herbal antibiotics, chaparral leaf fights infections of the intestinal and urinary tracts, and it is effective in treating diarrhea caused by pathogens. |
| Because of actions by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, chaparral has been labeled dangerous and pulled from many U.S. markets. On December 10, 1992, the agency issued a press release warning the public not to take chaparral because of its association with acute toxic hepatitis. Altogether, four people who took chaparral developed severe liver problems. In two cases, individuals consuming chaparral daily for several weeks suffered from jaundice and abdominal pain. In both cases, as well as in a third case documented by the Centers for Disease Control, the patients recovered after undergoing medical treatment and discontinuing their use of chaparral. In the fourth case, a patient with pre-existing liver damage took unknown quantities of chaparral and became gravely ill with liver and kidney failure. |
| The FDA concluded that chaparral "poses a potential health risk to the public, in particular to individuals with underlying liver damage due to acute or chronic disease." In response, health food stores stopped selling chaparral, and herbal tea makers removed it from their blends. Some tea blends were so popular that thousands of people were drinking them daily when the ban went into effect. |
| Did the FDA overreact? Considering that over 200 tons of chaparral were sold and presumably used by the general public between 1970 and 1990, and considering that at the time of the ban, chaparral was the primary ingredient in popular tea blends taken daily by thousands of Americans, four possible but unproven adverse reactions cannot be statistically significant. |
| In the two years that followed the chaparral scare, no additional cases of chaparral toxicity could be found. After an extensive review of chaparral's history, the Board of Trustees of the American Herbal Products Association voted in January 1995 to rescind its December 1992 recommendation that members voluntarily suspend the sale of chaparral. This decision was based on the findings of a panel of medical experts |
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