Turmeric - miracle spice?

This is just a quickie as my time is running out.

Last night on Michael Mosley's Trust me, I'm a doctor program they did one of their little experiments to see if turmeric was a wonder drug that would stop cancer in its tracks. Well there were a whole lot of other diseases as well, but I can't quite remember what they were. Anyway the end result was that turmeric powder was a whole lot better than pills for whatever it was they were testing (a chemical in the blood) and the pill was not really better than the placebo. Which I guess was interesting in itself, and also confirmed by another experiment they did about glucosamine in which the people thought they were getting glucosamine and felt 50% better on it, when actually it was a placebo. Mind over matter - so if they think it's doing good, and it isn't doing any harm - go for it - seemed to be the verdict.

Anyway back to the turmeric. I looked it up on the net and indeed there are a lot of websites out there extolling the virtues of turmeric, but it seemed to me that none of them was really academic and 'real' sounding. So I am a bit dubious. Well there seems to be sufficient evidence to continue researching but I don't think anyone is claiming any miracles as yet. And now I come to think of it I have a feeling that what it was doing was enabling them to predict whether a cancer would develop, rather than doing anything about a cancer.

This is a very bad post. I'm just waffling. I guess I'm just showing my cynicism in general about so-called natural cures and remedies - though that said - virtually all of our medicines are derived from natural things.

I don't think turmeric will do you any harm though. And it is an essential ingredient for just about any curry you care to make.

Not convinced by Michael Mosley, charming though he is.