About thirty years ago, in Israel, Dr. Shaul Eger, a physiologist specializing in animal husbandry, turned to his roots to cure an otherwise fatal heart arrhythmia. The cure he found was inspired by the Jewish doctor Assaf Harofeh, or Assaf the Physician who wrote that olive oil kept mental illness and an array of other ailments at bay. This also included ailments of the heart.

Although Dr. Eger had drawn his idea from ancient texts, his findings were backed by scientific proof. His Arab neighbors concurred with the health benefits from olive oil. At that time, while the oil had been featured prominently in the diet of Arab Israelis, Jewish Israelis hadn’t picked up on it. And so Dr. Eger had to get the unrefined oil from his neighbors. This oil was low in quality since it was prepared the traditional way. Yet, he consumed it, prescribing himself a spoonful a day until, within six months, it increased to eight spoonfuls a day. Due to this self-made prescription, Dr. Eger found that his arrhythmia, which used to make him black out, had disappeared.

Thirty years ahead into the future, Dr. Eger has invested money in science to create products which would hopefully put Israel’s olive oil on a competitive footing in the world market. Together with Prof. Ishak Neeman of the Technion Institute of Technology in Hafia, Dr. Eger developed the technology for the solidification of oil which was free from water, preservatives and trans fatty acids.

The resulting spreadable olive oil could then be used as a margarine substitute, and could also be used for the creation of various other goods. With his own brand, Dr. Eger Olive Oil Products, he manufactures health products with the oil as the main ingredient.
Despite modern medicine paving the way to finding new cures by matching DNA barcodes and such, it seems to me that traditional remedies still have much to offer. Traditional remedies are usually composed of naturally occurring ingredients, making them more practical than some modern counterparts, especially in developing countries.