Of roots, barks, paracetamol and EDTA.

Traditional native medicine has existed throughout the world from time immemorial. Early humans had sought cures for illness by using plants, animal parts, and mineral and as a species have survived. It can even be said that the forest, the home to our forebears, served as a veritable pharmaceutical depot as well. Physical evidence of use of herbal remedies goes back some 60,000 years to a burial site of a Neanderthal man uncovered in 1960 (1) The Penans in Sarawak even today scoff at visitors bringing along paracetamol and antidiarrhoeals when they go jungle trekking with them, saying that all the medicine they will ever need are in abundance around them : in the leaves and barks of trees. All cultures have long folk medicine histories that include the use of plants. Even in ancient cultures, people methodically and scientifically collected information on herbs and developed welldefined herbal pharmacopoeias. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 4 billion people-80 percent of the world population-use herbal medicine for some aspect of primary health care (Farnsworth et al., 1985). Herbal medicine is a major component in all indigenous peoples’ traditional medicine and is a common element in Ayurvedic, homeopathic, naturopathic, traditional oriental, and Native American Indian medicine. The sophistication of herbal remedies used around the world varies with the technological advancement of countries that produce and use them. These remedies range from medicinal teas and crude tablets used in traditional medicine to concentrated, standardized extracts produced in modern pharmaceutical facilities and used in modern medical systems under a physician’s supervision. It would be appropriate to review some of these traditional medical practices.