Everybody knows that chamomile tea is calming, or at least is supposed to be. But it had never been tested in a placebo controlled study, until now. A recent trial compared chamomile capsules to place- bo in the treatment of 57 patients with mild to moderate generalized anxiety dis- order. Active capsules each contained 220 mg of chamomile herb. Placebo cap- sules included inactive material and a drop of chamomile oil to provide the dis- tinctive smell of chamomile and maintain the double-blind. Participants took one capsule daily during the first week, increased to two capsules during the sec- ond week, and could go up to five per day if they did not respond. At the end of the eight-week study, chamomile signifi- cantly outperformed placebo on the pri- mary outcome measure (Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale). There were no statistically significant differences on several secondary measures, though the meas- ures numerically favored patients receiving chamomile; for instance, 57% of