Flu season has some people turning to Chinese remedies

“Big Snake Mak” has a secret weapon to fend off the threat of flu – it wriggles and hisses in a basket at his side.

Snakes have been used in China for thousands of years to cure a host of ailments – snake-fermented wine for arthritis, snake genitals for the kidneys and male sex drive, snake gall bladder for bronchitis.

And snake, says “Big Snake Mak” – otherwise known as serpent salesman Mak Tai-kwong – is a proven flu fighter.

“Those that eat snake bile four to five times every year will have a stronger body and will have much lower chances of contracting the flu,” Mr Mak said as he pulled a king cobra from his basket that he will kill, cook up and sell.

“Look at me, I’m over 80 but I rarely have the flu. It’s because I eat snake regularly.”

While not everyone would be inclined to follow Mak’s lead, some in the teeming city of seven million are turning away from the traditional flu jab in favour of Chinese herbal treatments.

Freelance photographer Vincent Du used Chinese medicine for chronic asthma as a child and reckons that herbal remedies keep the flu bug at bay – and ward off long-term illness.

“Western medicine takes effect faster but often has a lot of side effects,” he said.

Bian Zhao Xiang, director of the Chinese medicine clinic at Hong Kong’s Baptist University, said the number of flu patients at the clinic increased by 37 per cent in the latter part of last year compared to the same period in 2009.

The university plans to build a HK$800 million ($100 million) teaching hospital that would provide the city’s first in-patient Chinese medicine treatment. “Chinese medicine is by far a better treatment for seasonal flu (compared to Western medicine), in terms of its effectiveness, side effects and symptom control,” he said.