History of chaga
In folk medicine Chaga mushroom (Inonotus obliquus) has been long known as an antitumor agent. Records state that the mushroom was used for that purpose as long ago as early 12th century.
The Nobel Prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn once wrote about the amazing and beneficial properties of chaga mushroom in his book Cancer Ward. With this, he laid the foundation for comprehensive research on the medicinal properties of this mushroom. Since then, chaga mushroom has occupied a special position.
The medical literature of the past centuries describes several attempts by doctors to find out the therapeutic effect of birch mushroom on cancer patients. Thus, in 1857-1858, F.I. Inozemtsev tested this folk remedy on patients who were in the clinic of the Moscow Medical Institute.
The Russian chronicle of the eleventh century tells the story of the lips of Grand Duke Vladimir Monomakh being cured of cancer with the help of a decoction of a birch mushroom. In the sixteenth century, the inhabitants of Siberia used chaga as a panacea for many serious diseases.
Some data on the use of chaga in folk medicine gave start to a study in 1949 that continued in 1951 at the Botanical Institute named after Vladimir Leontievich Komarov.
After versatile clinical and chemical research, chaga was approved for use by the Pharmacological Committee of the USSR Ministry of Health in 1955.