Category Strange Cure and Therapies

Today mercury is handled with much care and never seen much except inside thermometers and labs. But in the early times, the Greeks, the Persians and the Chinese valued it much. Mercury was actually thought to offer immortality. The biggest victim of this misconception was Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huang who took some special mercury pills for immortality which instead had the opposite effect on him!

By the time he died at the age of 49, presumably through mercury poisoning, Qin Shi Huang had all but completed his colossal underground tomb. If he were unable to rule forever in waking life, then he would be emperor until the end of time in the afterlife.

The scale of the Chinese emperor’s mausoleum, the size of a great ancient city, remains breathtaking, its core a pyramid that once rose to 100m (328ft). Less than half this height today and long greened by vegetation the pyramid remains clearly visible. In terms of Chinese tradition, it forms the eye of a propitious landscape that can be read as a dragon.

 

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In the 19th century, a French chemist came up with a tonic called Vin Marianni made of Bordeaux wine stepped with coca leaves. It was supposed to restore a person’s health, strength, vitality, energy and what not. With a good dose of cocaine in it, it comes as no surprise that the tonic was a huge hit and many people carried a flask around the same way we carry Gatorade around! So popular was it that it was even awarded a gold medal!

The ethanol in the wine operated as a solvent, extracting cocaine from the coca leaf. When cocaine and alcohol are imbibed together, a third chemical compound, called cocaethylene, forms as the intoxicants are metabolized in the liver. This intense psychoactive is more euphoric, powerful, and toxic than cocaine or alcohol alone.

But all parties must come to an end. In 1906, the United States began enforcing labeling regulations through the Pure Food and Drug Act. Alcohol prohibition movements gained traction and the dangers of cocaine became public knowledge, all of which reduced the market for coca wine. A coca-less version of Vin Mariani was produced for sale in the United States, but it didn’t offer the same stimulant effect of a competing beverage that was also originally based on coca: Coca-Cola.

 

Picture Credit : Google

Magnets these days are used in advanced diagnostic devices, but in the past they served certain weird purposes. Back then, the moon was thought to be responsible for intermittent episodes of depression and hysteria. An Austrian physician knew the best way to beat the moon’s forces — magnets! Drape magnets all over the patient’s body and watch a medical miracle as body fluids get redistributed and mental equilibrium restored!

Some people use magnet therapy for treating pain, such as foot, back, or joint pain.

Research studies have been done on magnets, but there are not consistent results showing that magnets help with pain relief.

Young children and pregnant women should not use magnetic field therapy, because the safety of this therapy is not proved. People who have medical devices or implants with a magnetic field, such as a pacemaker, should not use magnet therapy, because it could interfere with the function of the implant.

Magnet therapy is not thought to have negative side effects or complications when it is combined with conventional medical treatment.

Talk with your doctor about any complementary health practice that you would like to try or are already using. Your doctor can help you manage your health better if he or she knows about all of your health practices.

 

Picture Credit : Google