Tea Tree Oil’s Magical Properties: Heal Thyself
Posted By Angelina Drennan on February 15, 2011
I wash my hair with a shampoo that contains tea tree oil. I blot my face a few times a week with tea tree–oil soaked pads. All I know about either product is that it makes my scalp and skin tingle for a few minutes after application. It’s a pleasant sensation I assume is beneficial, but to be honest, I have no idea what tea tree oil really does or why it’s popping up in so many hair and skincare products. Supposedly, it cures everything from acne to athlete’s foot to (possibly) certain viral infections. But just how magical is this essential oil?
Exploring the Probable and Possible Benefits Tea tree oil comes from the leaves of a plant called Melealeuca alternifolia, which grows natively in New South Wales, Australia. Aborigines in the area have used the leaves medicinally for many years, grinding them up to make a salve for skin wounds and using them to brew a tea for respiratory issues. Word of the plant’s healing properties spread during the 1920s, drawing interest in and desire for the oil far beyond the Bundjalung Aborigines of New South Wales. Since then, numerous studies have tested tea tree oil’s effects on skin ailments, infections, and the like and have concluded that it’s a potentially viable treatment for certain conditions. However, the jury’s still out on a number of medical problems tea tree oil purportedly remedies.
According to Medline Plus, a National Institutes of Health website, the Natural Medicines Comprehensive Database lists three conditions for which tea tree oil is “possibly effective”: athlete’s foot, nail fungus infections, and acne that’s not severe. A few studies have supported tea tree oil’s potential efficacy in these matters. For example, a 1996 study out of a university in Germany found that the oil inhibited growth when applied to numerous varieties of pathogenic fungi. A 1990 study conducted in New South Wales’s Royal Prince Alfred Hospital showed that tea tree oil proved just as successful as commonly used benzoyl peroxide in treating mild to moderate acne—albeit more slowly, but also with fewer unfavorable side effects.
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