British hospitals want honey dressings

By ROSALEEN MacBRAYNE

New Zealand manuka honey will be used to treat wounds in British hospitals.

Te Puke-based Comvita's newly established medical division has its first export order for medical grade manuka honey.

It came from United Kingdom wound care product manufacturer Brightwake, soon after that company was granted a drug tariff allowing manuka honey wound dressings to be fully funded by the National Health Service and marketed directly to British hospitals.

The order will be supplied by Comvita's Cambridge division, formed after the recent acquisition of Bee and Herbal New Zealand and Apimed Medical Honey.

Chief executive Graeme Boyd said the formation of the medical division and its first export order were major milestones for the company, and for the use of honey in international medical markets.

"The economic potential is huge and creates new opportunities for everyone involved in the production of manuka honey, including landowners and beekeepers," he said.

Comvita chairman Bill Bracks said the award-winning natural health products company had focused until now on creating "wellness".

"This takes us toward the illness end of the health spectrum."

The wound dressings were a mainstay product of the medical division.

The non-adherent dressings were impregnated with the honey to form a protective barrier and help create a moist, wound-healing environment as well as reducing scarring.

Mr Bracks said Comvita had a high degree of expertise, having pioneered the growth of the manuka honey market.

It also had a long association with Waikato University, where researchers identified an exceptional antibacterial property in some manuka honey.

"Manuka honey is a unique New Zealand product which offers a new method of treating otherwise untreatable wounds," he said.

"Even the flesh-eating bacteria succumb to the high activity manuka honey."