The vine that ate the South has a sobering effect on binge drinkers.

Researchers at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Mass., suspected that excessive drinking might be curbed by giving drinkers an extract of kudzu, a pesky, rapidly growing weed common in the Southern states. They knew it has been used for that purpose in China since 600 A.D. More recently, other researchers at Harvard University tested it on golden hamsters, bred and born to drink alcohol, and found that it reduced the rodents' intake.

"These results prompted us to test an herbal extract of it on humans," notes Scott Lukas, professor of psychiatry at McLean, a psychiatric hospital affiliated with Harvard Medical School. He and his colleagues recruited 14 men and women, average age 24 years. The "laboratory" was an apartment where each person was allowed to drink as many beers as he or she wanted, up to a maximum of six. After determining how much each person drinks normally, half were given a capsule of kudzu or an inactive pill or placebo.

After a so-called "washout" period, treatments were reversed. Those who had gotten the kudzu received a placebo and vice versa. Researchers who evaluated their drinking behavior did not know who received what or when.

The results were dramatic. "Those who took kudzu drank significantly less than those on placebo," says Lukas. "Everyone took that first drink when they came to the apartment after work. But the kudzu group was slower and less likely to reach for the second or third beer. They downed an average of one or two beers while the placebo group finished three or four. Alcohol consumption was almost cut in half."

Beyond that, those on kudzu drank more slowly. "They needed more gulps to finish each beer," Lukas continues. "That tells us they are responding to cues from their brains telling them they don't need to drink so much."

My comment and additional information

Kudzu has the several different names; gegen in china, kakkon in japan, galgun in korea and the pharmaceutical name is Radix Puerariae. it tastes sweet and acrid, its sap is cool.

The indication of Kudzu root are:

1. releases the muscles and clears heat - used for common cold symptoms, muscle ache, sore throat, fever.
2. nourishes the fluids and alleviates thirst
3. vents measles
4. alleviates diarrhea
5. treats symptoms of hypertension

Kudzu grows so fast and its root down to the earth so deep so that it really eats all over the mountains, in Korea and Japan which have been around a thousand years  and used for many different uses.; ropes,wallpaper, domestic animal food, the kudzu powder for cake, the kudzu juice for the summer drink and so on.

And kudzu flower is also used for the headache from hangover, abdominal distention, thirst, poor appetite, vomiting and its leaves stops bleeding in the external wound.