Milk thistle ineffective for liver disease

Milk thistle, an herbal remedy used worldwide for liver disease, does not appear to be effective, and there is not enough evidence to conclude that it is safe, an international team of researchers has concluded.

“We can’t see beneficial effects, we can’t exclude harmful effects, and in order to know more we need to do more randomized trials to find out do they actually help,” said Dr. Christian Gluud of Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark, the study’s lead author.

The market for milk thistle is enormous, Gluud noted, given that as many as 1 billion people around the world have liver disease due to alcoholism or hepatitis B or C. It could even be larger, he added, because some people may decide to take milk thistle for prevention.

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