Esencia de Mariposa Azul

People boil these barks when they are run down: after a long infection, after chemo has flattened the blood counts, or in that grey stretch when nothing tastes like food. That is folk use. Esencia de Mariposa Azul is our name for a four-plant house mix. It is not an old tribal recipe and it is not a stand-in for oncology.

• Cat’s Claw (Uncaria tomentosa)
  Vine bark, oxindole alkaloids. Araújo et al. 2012 (PMC3395261, PMID 22811748): 40 women on FAC chemo, 300 mg dry extract/day; neutrophils held closer to normal, comet-assay DNA damage lower. Small RCT. It did not shrink tumors.

• Tahuari (Handroanthus serratifolius, formerly Tabebuia serratifolia)
  Yellow lapacho. Sister page: pink lapacho. Gómez Castellanos et al. 2009 (PMID 18992801) is the honest review of the pink species: lapachol and β-lapachone look cytotoxic in dishes; NCI interest in the 1960s; vitamin K interaction; market bark is messy. Yellow tahuari shares the quinones. High dose is harsh, not a tumor drug.

• Suma (Pfaffia paniculata / Hebanthe eriantha)
  Brazilian ginseng, “para tudo.” da Silva et al. 2015 (PMC4444582, PMID 26075002): pfaffosides arrested HepG2 cells and pushed caspase-3 apoptosis. Cell line, not a person. The 2015 paper also uses Hebanthe paniculata.

• Chuchuhuasi (Monteverdia laevis / Maytenus krukovii)
  Deep bark for ache, cold in the joints, rebuilding. Name is unstable in trade. Published human data is thin.

Blue morpho is a symbol of change after a hard season. Do not take this as cancer treatment. Cat’s claw can fight immunosuppressants. Tahuari can thin clotting. Skip in pregnancy. Autoimmune disease needs a clinician watching.