Borage oil is an edible oil extracted from the seed of the bright blue plant Borago officinalis, which is mainly found in the Mediterranean region (Spain, Italy), but also prospers in select gardens in the United Kingdom, Denmark and Germany.
Like any decent folk remedy, there’s plenty of lore surrounding borage. Druid warriors of ancient Celtic cultures would prepare for battle by drinking wine steeped with borage, and their weapons were consecrated with it before they rode out to face the enemy. The Celts referred to borage as “borrach”, meaning courage, which might be where the name originated from.
There’s endless battle connections, as borage was embroidered into old Roman tapestries, and into the clothing of jousting knights, to provide blue colours. Crusaders drank borage in a tea before battle, and American settlers carried borage over the stormy Atlantic ocean in their long voyages.
These days, you won’t see Anthony Joshua or Tyson Fury munching down a whole borage flower before a fight. Its most popular usage these days might be for curing acne, at least on social media.
A concrete connection to clear skin
There’s a very clear reason why borage oil should work as an acne remedy, and that’s its content of gamma-linoleic acid (GLA), a type of fatty acid. At 24% of its total fats, borage oil is the most concentrated source of GLA known in the plant kingdom, ahead of blackcurrant seed oil and evening primrose oil.
To understand borage oil’s very real acne powers, you first must understand the complexities of the omega 3/omega 6 system. Both are polyunsaturated fats, giving them a lower melting point, unlike saturated fat in butter. You might know the basics that omega 3s are found in fish and generally anti-inflammatory, while omega 6s appear in vegetable oils like sunflower and soybean oil and are pro-inflammatory in excess.
A human being needs an omega 6/3 ratio of 3:1, ideally. However, the story gets more complicated, which allows borage oil to muscle in. Omega 3’s parent compound is ALA, and to lower inflammation in the body, it must be converted to the active forms of EPA and DHA. However, this conversion is highly inefficient in humans. This is why whole fish, which contains EPA and DHA, is far superior for omega 3 compared to plant sources like flax seed oil (often recommended), which mainly contains ALA.
As for omega 6s, the parent compound is linoleic acid, found all over nature. This is converted into GLA via modifications in the molecular structure. This is later transformed to D-GLA, until the final transformative step occurs – the production of arachidonic acid. This is the main pro-inflammatory element in the omega 6 chain, as arachidonic acid massively stimulates the production of eicosanoids, a class of inflammatory immune system chemicals, which includes prostaglandins, leukotrienes and more. The “arachidonic acid cascade” is a phrase often used when discussing diseases of inflammation.
GLA is strange though, because while technically an omega 6, it behaves more like an omega 3. GLA rapidly transforms into D-GLA, and this fatty acid actually competes with arachidonic acid for the enzymes used to synthesise immune system chemicals.
With D-GLA hogging enzymes like cyclooxygenase and lipoxygenase, arachidonic acid will be less capable of producing its pro-inflammatory eiconodsides. Even better, D-GLA itself uses the enzymes to produce anti-inflammatory chemicals.
Wait a second, didn’t we just say that GLA and D-GLA ultimately convert into arachidonic acid anyway, thus undoing their benefits? Yes, and some will inevitably be converted, but this is where omega 3s come in. Taking omega 3s alongside GLA has been found to significantly reduce the rise in arachidonic acid.
It’s believed that omega 3s block the enzyme used in the conversion, allowing you to only experience GLA’s anti-inflammatory powers. This doesn’t need to be a fish oil pill – it can be two servings of oily fish weekly.
By taking omega 3 and GLA concurrently, you can make excessive omega 6s in your diet less damaging, whether it’s from a burger or bucket of popcorn, as the ultimate pro-inflammatory element, arachidonic acid, is much less likely to do damage, or even be created at all.
Gamma linoleic acid has a well mapped-out connection to reduced inflammation, and borage oil is the greatest source of it.
Bonus benefits of GLA
Gamma linoleic acid has a confirmed secondary benefit which could plant the seed of clear skin. It strongly blocks the 5-alpha reductase enzyme which creates all DHT in the body, via conversion from testosterone.
DHT stimulates the sebaceous glands to pump out more oil and is ten times stronger at doing so than testosterone. I mainly recommend this strategy for women, as men require DHT for health and vitality, but it’s another skill which GLA and its borage oil delivery system contains. GLA also has a side benefit in producing a metabolite called 15-OH-DGLA, or 15-hydroxydihomo-r-linolenic acid, which is believed to reduce keratin production in the skin, thus preventing clogged pores.
Borage oil has a direct study on acne
Scientists already knew that GLA could spiral into an anti-inflammatory cascade of events. They knew that it could lower 5-alpha reductase on human skin. So their next logical step was to test GLA on acne directly, which they did in a 2014 study.
Yet there was one detail they only casually measured: that the “GLA” they tested was borage oil. Somehow, this didn’t make it to the title of the study. This means that among all the natural acne supplements touted on social media, borage oil is one of the few tested directly on acne. Psyllium husk and chamomile tea, for all their promise (I cautiously recommend both), cannot say the same.
Anyway, the participants were 45 acne patients, with a mean age of 23.7, and a range of 18-33. Their diets were standardised, with a similar intake of energy and nutrients. The duration was 10 weeks, providing plenty of time for the remedy to succeed (or fail miserably).
36 men and 9 women took part. The first group was a control taking nothing. The second group took EPA and DHA, the two highly bioavailable forms of omega 3s found in fish oil. The final group took “GLA”, which was actually 2000mg of borage oil daily, containing 400mg of GLA. A Korean pharmacy prepared all the capsules in a way that made them indistinguishable visually.
The results after 10 weeks were fantastic. A reduction in inflammatory acne of just over 50% in the borage oil group, and just over 40% in the EPA/DHA group.
Borage oil actually defeated the omega 3s, which are generally touted as the anti-inflammatory powerhouses. Borage oil was slightly weaker for non-inflammatory acne, with a reduction of just over 15%, versus a near 20% reduction for EPA/DHT. We know that the omegas work their magic most via the pro-inflammatory chemical network, so it’s not surprising that inflammatory acne benefitted most for both. In the control group, there was a tiny increase in both forms of acne, which was probably just statistical noise.
Warning – borage oil contains dangerous toxins
Borage oil might have a study directly on acne, but it fails at the last hurdle. The borage plant contains defensive toxins called pyrrolizidine alkaloides, specifically a form called amabiline. These are found mainly in the borage leaves, but also the seeds, and they’re proven to transfer to the oil. Germany’s Federal Health Agency recommends a safe intake of no more than 1ug of pyrrolizidine alkaloids per day, but it’s been estimated that regular borage oil supplementation can lead to up to 10ug of intake daily.
Pyrrolizidine alkaloids are no joke, and not a toxin to underestimate. They’re not like the glycoalkaloids in potatoes, a defensive toxin which causes mild inflammation in some, but has no real chance of killing you. Pyrrolizidine alkaloids are especially dangerous to the liver, as during digestion, they are absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract and transferred using the portal vein directly to the liver. They’re metabolised by esterases into a harmless metabolite called nectine acid, but the enzyme CYP450 (the same enzyme that metabolises caffeine) also metabolises some, producing highly reactive, toxic byproducts called pyrrolic esters (EPy). These are highly hepatoxic, and can be metabolised further into alcohol pyrroles, which are carcinogenic and mutagenic. The liver is the most strongly affected organ, as that’s where this process takes place.
Pyrrolizidine alkaloids are also capable of escaping the liver and into the bloodstream. There’s a minor connection to acne, as they are ultimately removed from the body by the antioxidant glutathione, depleting its levels.
Seizures have been reported after consuming 1500-3000mg of borage oil daily. Bad news – the great study on acne used 2000mg daily. This isn’t some far-fetched fearmongering where you’d have to take an enormous dosage to actually suffer; the threat is real. Pyrrolizidine alkaloids have even been found in honey made from borage. Honeybees adore the borage flower as it produces extremely high quantities of nectar.
That’s why despite the excellent study on acne, I don’t recommend that everyone rush out and buy borage oil. I don’t recommend borage oil unless there’s a very specific guarantee on the bottle that the contents have been tested in a laboratory for pyrrolizidine alkaloids. If the bottle says “pure” or “natural”, yet fails to mention PAs specifically, then it’s a no go.
The danger is that pyrrolizidine alkaloids are long term villains. If they caused a sudden short term inflammatory explosion, then you’d instantly know what malicious effects they were having, but instead they build up insidiously over time. The pyrrolizidine alkaloids could be damaging liver cells even while your acne melts away to your great joy.
Is blackcurrant seed oil an alternative?
Blackcurrant seed oil is squeezed from the seeds of blackcurrants, as you’d expect. After borage oil, it’s the second richest source of gamma linoleic acid in the world, with a content of 16-20%. The benefits all seem to be present, as according to a 1999 study when it was tested as a supplement, it has the power to reduce prostaglandin E2s manufactured from arachidonic acid. A study on babies found that by 12 months of age, they had significantly reduced atopic dermatitis (a classic inflammatory skin disease) compared to those consuming olive oil.
Blackcurrant seed oil lacks the pyrrolizidine alkaloids which make borage oil risky. There’s no nasty new toxins to be aware of. The GLA is slightly lower, but easily high enough for acne patients to benefit.
The one pitfall is that blackcurrant seed oil has a higher level of linoleic acid (omega 6), at 47.5%. Our quest as acne patients is to not have too high an omega 6 intake due to cranking up inflammation. Even though GLA is technically an omega 6, and you can limit the conversion to damaging arachidonic acid by eating more omega 3s, you still don’t want to eat too much omega 6. That said, if you stick to the 2000mg (2 gram) dosage recommended in the great acne study above, this won’t flood your body with omega 6s, particularly if salmon or sardines are one of your staples, to counterbalance them. Our advice against omega 6s is mainly for chips dripping with many grams of grease, burgers, popcorn etc.
If you want to benefit from GLA, blackcurrant seed oil is a much safer option than borage oil.
Verdict
Borage oil has loads of interesting lore. For example, Homer wrote in his Odyssey tome about nepenthe, a remedy which ‘eased men’s pains and irritations, making them forget their troubles — a drink of this, once dipped in wine, would guarantee no man would let a tear fall on his cheek, not even if his father and his mother died’. Some theorise that borage was this mysterious remedy. Middle Age folklore even advised women to slip borage into a man’s beverage to make him more interested in proposing.
Borage oil looks fantastic for acne and it’s a rare remedy to have an actual study. But sadly, those powers are locked behind a wall of pyrrolizidine alkaloids, unless you can find a brand with a cast iron guarantee of being laboratory tested.
Luckily, there’s loads of other avenues for clearing acne. If you barely eat any oily fish, than omega 3s alone could wipe out 40% of your acne, as shown by the same great study on borage oil.
Thanks for reading!