This thing has saved me from tons of flus and bad colds
when I got back from china I felt like I was about to
get really sick and I put myself on echinacea for a few
days and I never got sick. Don't eat it for more than
4 weeks straight though
from http://www.herbs.org/greenpapers/echinacea.html
Echinacea has a rich tradition of use by North American Plains Indians
who used it medicinally more than any other plant. It was prominent in
modern American medicine in the early 20th Century, and was