Mother's Milk - Early Role of Mother's Milk as A Nutriceutical

By definition, a nutriceutical is a functional food that has nutritional/caloric value and pharmacological (drug) effects. Products from Nature have a long and intriguing history of providing man with useful materials for his daily life. None is more important than the medium-chain fats found in mother's milk and other natural products. Human milk having sanitizing effects was recognized early in human medicine. In the history of cataract surgery that extends back at least 3000 years, the translation of Hindu manuscripts gives detailed methods of the great surgeon Susruta. He practiced asepsis (fumigated the operating room with sweet vapors) and gave an excellent account of his technique of couching (depression of the lens into the vitreous of the eye) as well as an outline of postoperative care. After couching the eye, the milk of a nursing mother would be distributed into the eyes conjunctiva much in the way that antiseptics are used presently after an operation.

The knowledge that mother's milk acted as an antiseptic agent, was lost until recently (Fieldsteel, 1974). He found that the cream but not the skim milk was biologically active after heating. Kabara et al (circa 1966) evaluating the structure-function properties of lipids found that certain fats, fatty acids and more particularly their monoglycerides, were antimicrobial. It was concluded from these two studies that the non-protein portion of human milk that was biologically active were the fatty acids and monoglyceride.

Much of the modern research on the germicidal activity of fatty acids was concluded between 1920 to 1940. More up-to-date studies have been reviewed (Kabara 1978,1984 and 1997). The term "antimicrobial" is intended to cover antibacterial, anti- yeast/fungi and antiviral effects.

Enveloped viruses, as Herpes and others, can be inactivated as do other microorganisms by treatment with specific fatty acids. The antimicrobial effects of fatty acids found in mother's milk against some common microorganisms are given in Table 1.

Table 1 Minimal Inhibitory Concentrations (mM) of Fatty acids found in mother's milk

Fatty acid	Staphylococcus Aureus	Streptococcus Group A	Candida albicans
Capric (C10, 2.0%)*	2.90	1.45	2.90
Lauric (C12, 10%)	2.49	1.45	2.49
Mvristic (C14, 6.0%)	4.37	0.55	4.37
PaImitic (C16, 22%)	Nl	3.90	Nl
Stearic (C18, 8.0%)	Nl	Nl	Nl
Oleic (C18:1, 32%)	Nl	1.77	Nl
Linoleic (C18:2, 15%)	Nl	0.09	0.46
Linolenic(C18:3, 0.1%)	1.79	0.35	Nl

Approximate concentration in mother's milk Nl, not inhibitory at the concentrations tested (1.0 mg/ml.).

From other studies Kabara et al have shown that the monoester of lauric acid, monolaurin (Lauricidin®, is much more active than the free fatty acid. Indeed, mother’s milk provides an abundance of these active antimicrobial agents to the nursing infant.

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