So we are to be concerned over the heavy metals, chlorine, fluoride, and persistent toxic ick in the hot domestic
water supply because it opens our pores, and the surfactants in the soap disrupt the phospholipid layer that usually protects our skin from absorbing bad stuff, but we can't expect to be able to use that same vehicle to deliver herbal medicine to our subdermal and dermal tissues?
I am not taking a position here, only pointing out contradictions in popularly held health concerns. I am also not going to comment on moringa, because I frankly don't know anything about it. We haven't yet crossed paths.
Also, it occurs to me that things applied to the outside of the body might be feeding the beneficial external microbiome. So if the colonies of beneficial
fungi and bacteria on your skin are made happier and they start doing their job better, is it possible that it could speed the processes of things like immune response and healing, and even be responsible for blocking vectors of infection?
And as to limited duration of contact, who remembers those ivory commercials on TV, where they'd rub glass with ivory and their competitor brand, and ivory would rinse clean, but the competitor left soap residue? Many natural soaps I have used leave detectible residues, even if it's just a little coconut oil feel on the skin.
Medicinal ingredients could potentially linger there, too, depending on the potency of the ingredients.
I am not saying anyone is wrong, only that there might be more going on here than is readily apparent.
I would be interested to hear from anyone practised in herbalism on the subject, and if we could get a dermatologist, that would be awesome, too.
Good line of questioning, though. It hadn't occurred to me to wonder to what extent what they put in soap intentionally, for therapeutic benefit, was actually absorbed, and to what extent it was psychological and sensory, making us feel better and cleaner by aromatherapy and association.
Dale, didn't you mention in another
thread that they use moringa seeds to sterilise water? Wouldn't moringa have an anti-bacterial effect on the soap you put it in? I know that's a practical benefit outside the health claims that are the focus of the thread, but maybe that's the original purpose of moringa soap, with the rest you mentioned being hopeful afterthoughts used to
sell the product.
-CK
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
-Robert A. Heinlein