The low down on essential oils by Dr Jessica Garcia
This blog contribution is by Dr. Jessica Garcia -Thank you Jessica for contributing to The Eco Well blog! Stay tuned! From here on out, we will be regularly featuring educational posts from scientists in and around the cosmetics space. Our goal is to create a knowledge-sharing platform, accessible to anyone :).
The human race has had a long-standing relationship with plants from a medicinal standpoint. We relied on herbalism (almost exclusively) for medicinal care until the advent of modern medicine (here is a nice review on herbalism throughout history PMID 22654398). Even in the age of modern medicine, many of our antibiotics, chemotherapeutics, antifungals (and others-this list is not exhaustive) are either direct products of natural sources- or are derivatized off of natural scaffolds. An open access review on the subject can be found at PMID: 24957513.
So I don’t find it unusual that people would look to plant extracts, like essential oils (EOs), as an approach to health. EOs have risen to extraordinary popularity in the past 20 years or so. With this sharp rise in popularity has come many claims about the utility of EOs in daily life and their application to human health. Very often these claims are served up with the ol’ ‘these are natural- natural is better’ rhetoric. Let me say before I kind of bash them- I love EOs! BUT all too often I hear or see folks posting about how natural they are, how completely safe they are, and how humans we’re meant to use them to heal themselves. So lets quickly address these points. Firstly- concentrating down thousands of pounds of plant material into a single pound of hydrophobic liquid is not something I’d consider natural. Secondly, many folks operate under the assumption that anything derived from nature is inherently safe, and that any synthetically produced molecules are the opposite- inherently ‘toxic’; this is known as the nature fallacy. The reality is- nature produces some of the MOST toxic substances known to man, so whether or not something comes from nature says nothing about its safety. Lastly, any biological benefit naturally derived small molecules may offer the human race is completely tangential to the reason it evolved in the organism in the first place. These molecules were selected for, from an evolutionary standpoint, to offer the organism some sort of positive selective advantage; generally in the form of predatory deterrents or antimicrobials- we humans just piggy backed on their eons of perfection :P.
Ok- now back to the topic at hand - these beautiful smelling bottles of complex and heterogenous chemicals. We often hear them touted for their ‘healing properties’ for everything from the common cold to cancer… but can they actually DO anything you hear people saying they can?
Well, yes and no. The answer really boils down to what you intend to use them for, and what you expect them to do. There is no denying that EOs possess interesting, biologically active constituents. In fact, they quite regularly induce death in cancerous cells, kill antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria, protect from neurodegeneration, inhibit bacterial biofilms (I could go on and on), but they are doing so in test tubes, tissue culture (sometimes animals), and often at INCREDIBLY high dosages. However, it doesn’t feel like we hear about these HUGE experimental caveats when this type of information is being relayed to us. Instead, we hear about all of the (very neat!!) upside... and none of the (very significant) downsides. The poor bioavailability. The inordinately high dosage. The potential toxicities or irritation to the organs or skin. And the (almost) total lack of translational human studies. So using EOs in the aforementioned applications, while very interesting from an experimental standpoint, are really – in almost every case- completely irrelevant as curatives at the stage of discovery that they are in.
With all that being said, I DO believe there are also fantastic applications for EOs in our lives (I mean… obviously! I am the essentiallyoilychemist, after all <3). Many people use aromatherapy as a compliment to their mental health work, aiding in meditative practice and uplifting mood. EOs can be used to make salves or balms for sore muscles (think homemade Bengay! Constituents like menthol and methyl salicylate are at work here) or decongestants (think DIY vaporub! Constituents like menthol, 1,8 cineole and camphor are some players here). You can use them to make lovely perfumes. They can be used in household cleaning products should one prefer some plant-power based formulations (antimicrobial constituents like cinnamaldehyde, eugenol, thymol, menthol and strong degreasers like citrus oils (mainly limonene) work well here!). I could go on. The point is- there are a wide number of valid applications for these plant extracts in our everyday lives, should we so choose to use them, as long as we are observing appropriate safety considerations (*cough* please reconsider ingesting EOs in water or using them undiluted on your skin) BUT treatment of EOs as medicines is absolutely not one of them.
A quick note from Jen - Jessica submitted this article before the covid-19 turned into the pandemic it is today. In light of some of the claims I’ve seen online, I just wanted to highlight - we do not have data to demonstrate essential oils will be effective against corona viral strains. If you’re using a hand sanitizer, for e.g., you need 60-70% alcohol to be effective against the viral strain (a data supported measure). Essential oil based sanitizers may just give you false confidence… If you see someone recommending a DIY sanitizer to protect against covid-19 online using essential oils as the sanitizing agent, please report them. I know Jessica agrees with this point. Sorry for the interuption! Back to the article :).
EOs aren’t for everyone, and that’s A-ok!
If you are hearing/ seeing folks making claims about their EOs curing serious illnesses, and asserting that you can be ‘healed’ too- ask them (politely!) if they can provide evidence to support their claims. Ask them to help you understand the biology. Often misinformation about EOs is spread by a simple lack of clarity on the biology (this stuff is SO nuanced), so asking folks to give a scientifically robust explanation can do nothing but help any situation!
Before I close I’d like to add- We also should keep in mind, always, how resource intensive EOs are. They are highly burdensome from an environmental standpoint, and this is something all consumers of EOs should be cognizant of. @sagedfibers has a very thought-provoking article on the subject (https://www.sagedfibers.com/journal/essential-oil-conservation).
Happy oiling! <3 – Jess (@essentiallyoilychemist)
Dr. Jessica Garcia
Bio: Jessica received a Bachelors of Science in biochemistry from California State University, Fullerton in 2013 and a Doctorate in chemistry (focused in novel small molecule antimicrobials) from University of California, Santa Cruz in 2018. She currently works for a small biotech start up in the bay area focused in the NGS (next generation sequencing) space. In her free time she loves to talk about science (wink), do yoga, and enjoy the outdoors with her young son and husband.