Herbal remedies have been used for thousands of years. Today an estimated one-third of adult Americans—some 60 million people—use herbal medicines each year, spending more than $3.2 billion on them. In the rest of the world, approximately 64 percent of the population relies on herbal medicines. Despite their overwhelming popularity and long history, we know relatively little about the safety and effectiveness of herbal remedies. Scientific study should make these remedies far safer and more effective in the future. Global recognition of nature’s green pharmacy should inspire individuals and nations to protect this extraordinary resource.
What is the real world scenario of Drug Development? How are the modern Drugs related to the Prehistoric Herbs and treatment Process?
Modern pharmaceuticals cannot treat every condition effectively, and some drugs have unwanted side effects. In the late 20th century herbal medicine made a comeback as people began to seek alternatives to these drugs.
Just forgetting the Nepalese and the world market let us just concentrate in the U.S. Scenerio. Today more than 1,500 herbal preparations are marketed in the United States, not only in health food stores but also in pharmacies, supermarkets, department stores, and even truck stops.
Another indication of the importance of herbals: About one-quarter of all U.S. prescription drugs are derived from herbs. The pharmaceutical industry uses around 120 different compounds derived from plants in the drugs it manufactures, and it discovered nearly three-quarters of these compounds by studying folk remedies. Examples of drugs from plants include quinine, from the bark of the South American cinchona tree, used to treat some strains of malaria; digitalis, a widely prescribed heart medication, derived from the foxglove plant; salicylic acid, the source of aspirin, from willow bark; and taxol, for treating ovarian cancer, from the yew tree.
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