In a world of superbugs that are resistant to antibiotics and the coming “plague” of new viruses, scientific research shows that oleuropein kills viruses, fungi, bacteria and other disease-causing parasites. From its origins as a folk remedy to research done in the ’60s by the prestigious Upjohn pharmaceutical company, olive leaf extract from the olive tree (Olea europaea) has been identified as a powerful ally against the common cold, flu, and the seven known herpes viruses, including Epstein-Barr, yeast infections, malaria, skin, heart, joint trouble and even hypertension (see table 1).

The knowledge of the medicinal properties of the olive tree date back to the early 1800s, when it was used in liquid form as a treatment for malaria. According to the 1854 Pharmaceutical Journal of Provincial Transactions, doctors stated that the properties of the olive tree deserved extensive investigation. In the early 1900s a bitter compound was found in the leaves of certain olive trees called “oleuropein,” which was thought to be part of the olive tree’s potent disease-resistant structure. In 1962 an Italian researcher recorded that oleuropein lowered blood pressure in animals. Fellow European researchers validated that claim and also found it to increase blood flow in the coronary arteries, relieve arrhythmia and prevent intestinal muscle spasms. The search was on for the chemical agent and a Dutch researcher found it was elenolic acid. Further European research determined this compound to have strong bactericidal, virucidal and anti-parasitic properties as well.

“All animals coexist with an indigenous microflora. We are each heavily colonized by, and live in a state of peaceful coexistence with, countless microorganisms that colonize our skin and most of our mucosal surfaces,” says Stanford T. Shulman, M.D., chief of the Division of Infectious Diseases at The Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago. “Beginning shortly after birth we swim in a veritable sea of microbes,” he adds.

An ally such as olive leaf extract is a welcome relief for our present reality of overloaded immune systems due to ecological imbalance and overcrowded, industrialized lives complicated by more changes due to ‘hi tech’ at any price. It is a comment on our times that to escape being held hostage to potent, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, yeasts, fungi, protozoa and worms, we allow ourselves to be exposed to drugs with multiple, and oftentimes long-term, side effects.

To put it succinctly, olive leaf extract kills germs and infections of all kinds and that power comes from its active agent, elenolic acid with its salt compound, calcium elenolate. It is what our ancestors have known about since the mention of the olive tree, the “tree of life” in the book of Genesis in the Bible’s Old Testament. Is it an accident that the olive branch is the symbol of peace on the flag of the United Nations? Perhaps it will soon become the symbol of health and longevity too. The father of medicine, Hippocrates, recommended olive oil for curing ulcers, cholera and muscular pains. Older Greek women and men, living long and free of breast and prostate cancer by happily anointing their food with extra virgin olive oil, bemoaned the introduction of American fast food to the younger generation on their pristine, sun-drenched islands on a recent CBS evening news special.

For four thousand years Italians have lived to old age by using olive leaf tea or chopped olive leaves in salad to treat microbial infections. Ask Wilford B. Graciano, the chief operating officer of ConMac Securities, Inc., and he’ll tell how in 1996 he survived his bout with a relatively rare echovirus causing chronic aseptic meningitis, which can be fatal. After going through a nightmare round with the medical establishment at enormous personal expense, this determined individual was saved by daily doses of his 98-year-old Italian grandmother’s homemade jars of olive leaf liquid. (Read more about it in Dr. Morton Walker’s book, Olive Leaf Extract.)

In his book Dr. Walker reports that olive leaf components lower high blood pressure, citing the anecdotal evidence from Dr. Isaac D. Freez of Santa Barbara, California, who said, “I don’t oversell olive leaf extract but simply present it as an option for a variety of health problems. Certainly it is useful for colds, flu and other infections, including traveler’s diarrhea. I do find olive leaf extract lowers hypertension, so my patients with high blood pressure are told to take it as an adjunct remedy for their difficulty, along with eating the Mediterranean diet.”

Sixty-one-year-old Collin Hargreaves, a shoe clerk trying to continue working in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, has been the victim of atrial fibrillation for two years and nothing in the allopathic medical armamentarium helped him. “The medical profession has given up on me completely,” he states. “I’ve taken all of the available prescribed drugs: digoxin, beta blockers, the calcium antagonists, anticoagulants and more. When I refused the implantation of a permanent pacemaker, two top cardiologists from this region said they couldn’t do anything for me and advised that I get my family and financial affairs in order.

“Based on the cardiologists’ verdicts I’ve sought out health care from a specialist in alternative medicine,” Hargreaves continues. “Olive leaf extract was my holistic physician’s recommendation, and it’s worked well for my atrial fibrillation… After taking olive leaf extract capsules for three months I can chop wood, take long walks and do chores around the house, when none of those activities could I do before. The heart palpitations, weakness, faintness and shortness of breath always stopped me then. Those symptoms have gone away. My physician read your two articles, Dr. Walker, the first in the Townsend Letter for Doctors & Patients and the second in Explore! For the Professional.”

A 1994 study reported, “Oleuropein protects low density lipoprotein from oxidation.” Conducted at the University of Milan, Institute of Pharmacological Sciences, the study indicates that oleuropein interferes with biochemical events that are implicated in hardening of the arteries.

Researchers at the University of Milan also found that oleuropein has the antioxidant activity of various flavonoids with a concomitant reduction of peripheral vascular disease and coronary heart disease following the ingestion of olive leaf extract and/or olive oil.

Visioli, F., and Galli, C., Life Sciences Vol. 55, No. 24 pp. 1865-1971.

Leroy Weygand of Bakersfield, California, reports that at 70 years of age he had a long history of hiatal problems. He says, “In 1968 I was operated on to remove a ruptured ulcer and a ruptured hernia...the condition I now live with is the recurrence of the hernia condition. Over three years the problem has amplified itself to a point where the pain was so great after eating as little as one slice of bread that it was easier to skip meals to prevent the occurrence of the pain.

“This is the only product that has given me instant relief and is one hundred percent reliable with its results.

“The healing power of the olive leaf has been long neglected. I will continue to tell all of my friends and acquaintances of this product and suggest its use to keep the body in a good state of health.”

Whenever harmful microbes are killed off by the kind of components of olive leaf extract, their envelopes of proteins are re-absorbed through the weakened mucous membrane and can cause allergic reactions due to the resulting toxicity. The body’s immune system goes into high gear and reacts at the infectious sites by temporarily worsening an individual’s symptoms. It is generally recognized that this “die-off” reaction is an indication that the treatment is working. The condition known also as the “Herxheimer reaction” usually disappears within four days and the individual emerges from the tunnel of discomfort feeling better than ever before as the overloaded immune system gets a much needed break.