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Cinnamon and health
The link between cinnamon and health has been recognised for a long time in traditional cultures. Cinnamon is thought to be antimicrobial, antiinflammatory (1, 2, 3, 4), antifungal (1, 2), antioxidant, antidiabetic (1, 2, 4), antimycotic (1) and anticancer (1, 2, 5). Thus, people have been using the spice for multiple purposes, including bad breath (1, 2), colon health (1, 2, 3), coagulation (1) and food preservation (4). What is cinnamon? Cinnamon is a spice obtained from the bark of trees in the Cinnamomum genus (4, 7). Only some of the approximately 250 species in the genus are used as a spice (1, 6, 7). Cinnamomum verum, a.k.a. C. zeylanicum,…