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The recent resurgence of plant remedies results from several factors: the effectiveness of plant medicines; the side-effects of most modern drugs and most importantly the development of science and technology.
Several important drugs used in modern medicine have come from medicinal plant studies, chief amongst taxol/paclitaxel, vinblastine, vincristine, topotecan, irinotecan, etoposide and teniposide.
However, studies on plants are very limited, with only about a third of the million or so species of higher plants identified and named by scientists.
Of those named, only a tiny fraction has been studied.
Nowadays the linking of the indigenous knowledge of medicinal plants to modern research activities provides a new approach, which makes the rate of discovery of drugs much more effective than with random collection.
In recent years, the use of traditional medicine information on plant research has again received considerable interest.
The use of plants as medicine goes back to early man. Evidences of this early association have been found in the grave of a Neanderthal man buried 60 000 years ago.
Pollen analysis indicated that the numerous plants buried with the corpse were all of medicinal value. Ancient China is also a source of information about the early medicinal uses of plants. The Pun-tsao, a pharmacopoeia that was actually published around 1600, contained thousands of herbal cures that are attributed to the works of Shen-nung, China’s legendary emperor who lived over 4 500 years ago.
The People’s Republic of China is the leading country for incorporating traditional herbal medicine into a modern healthcare system.
The resulting blend of herbal medicine, acupuncture and Western medicine is China’s unique answer to the healthcare needs of over one billion people.
Plantations exist for the cultivation of medicinal plants and the training of doctors, with active research programs also investigating potentially useful specimens.
In India, herbal medicine dates back several thousand years to the Rig-Veda, the collection of Hindu sacred verses.
This has led to a system of health care known as Ayurvedic medicine.
One useful plant from this body of knowledge is snakeroot, Rauwolfia serpentina, used for centuries for its sedative effects.
Today the active components in snakeroot are widely used in Western medicine to treat high blood pressure. The renewed interest in medicinal plants has focused on herbal cures among indigenous populations around the world.
This is especially true among indigenous peoples in the tropical rain forests.
Tropical rainforests cover only 12 percent of the land area of the Earth, yet they are home to between 50 percent and 90 percent of the world’s species. They contain 90 percent of non-human primates, 40 percent of all prey birds and 80 percent of the world’s insects and — particularly important — over 60 percent of all known plants, which have been studied by some of the world’s leading ethnobotanists including Richard Schultes, Mark Plotkin, and Walter Lewis.
Hopefully, these investigations will add new medical plants to the world’s pharmacopoeia before they are lost forever.
This past decade has obviously witnessed a tremendous surge in acceptance and public interest in natural therapies both in developing and developed countries, with these herbal remedies being available not only in drug stores, but now also in food stores and supermarkets.
It is estimated that up to four billion people (representing 80 percent of the world’s population) living in the developing world rely on herbal medicinal products as a primary source of healthcare and traditional medical practice which involves the use of herbs and is viewed as an integral part of the culture in those communities.
The use of herbal remedies has also been widely embraced in many developed countries with complementary and alternative medicines (CAMs) now becoming mainstream in the UK and the rest of Europe, as well as in North America and Australia.
In fact, while places like the UK have a historical tradition of using herbal medicine, the use is also widespread and well established in some other European countries.
In these developed countries, the most important among many other reasons for seeking herbal therapy is the belief that it will promote healthier living. Herbal medicines are, therefore, often viewed as a balanced and moderate approach to healing and individuals who use them as home remedies and over-the-counter drugs spend huge amount of money (in excess of billions of dollars) on herbal products.
This explains in part the reason sales of herbal medicines are booming and represent a substantial proportion of the global drug market.
As the global use of herbal medicinal products continues to grow and many more new products are introduced into the market, public health issues, and concerns surrounding their safety are also increasingly recognised.
Although some herbal medicines have promising potential and are widely used, many of them remain untested and their use also not monitored.
This makes knowledge of their potential adverse effects very limited and identification of the safest and most effective therapies as well as the promotion of their rational use more difficult.
It is also common knowledge that the safety of most herbal products is further compromised by lack of suitable quality controls, inadequate labelling, and the absence of appropriate patient information. It has become essential, therefore, to furnish the general public including healthcare professionals with adequate information to facilitate better understanding of the risks associated with the use of these products and to ensure that all medicines are safe and of suitable quality.
Since safety continues to be a major issue with the use of herbal remedies, it becomes imperative, therefore, that relevant regulatory authorities put in place appropriate measures to protect public health by ensuring that all herbal medicines are safe and of suitable quality.
The recent resurgence of public interest in herbal remedies has been attributed to several factors, some of which include; various claims on the efficacy or effectiveness of plant medicines, preference of consumers for natural therapies and a greater interest in alternative medicines.
Other factors include the belief that herbal products are superior to manufactured products, dissatisfaction with the results from orthodox pharmaceuticals and the belief that herbal medicines might be effective in the treatment of certain diseases where conventional therapies and medicines have proven to be ineffective or inadequate.
The high cost and side effects of most modern drugs, improvements in the quality, efficacy, and safety of herbal medicines with the development of science and technology, not to forget patients’ belief that their physicians have not properly identified the problem, hence the feeling that herbal remedies are another option and a movement toward self-medication.
As a result traditional plant medicine will become an area of ever-increasing importance in the health-care system in the future.
Feedback can be directed to Dr TB Magodora (MBChB-UZ, DpTCM-Sh, China) at [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> and WhatsApp 0776 903 026.
Disclaimer: This article is for information only and should not be used for the diagnosis or treatment of medical conditions. Dr TB Magodora has used all reasonable care in compiling the information but make no warranty as to its accuracy. Consult a doctor or other health care professional for diagnosis and treatment of medical conditions.
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