Correspondents' Correspondence
LAND, THOMAS
Correspondents' correspondence BRIEF TAKEOUTS OF MORE THAN PERSONAL INTEREST FROM LETTERS AND OTHER COMMUNICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS. Herbal Healing Geneva—For countless generations African...
...Traditional medicinal plants tend to be abundant and cheaply available where they are used...
...Mohana Krishnaswamy, a consultant in biological science at the Captain Srinivasamur-thy Drug Research Institute in Madras...
...The discovery was made by Dr...
...another, inassociation with Japanese scientists, is concentrating on inflammation, cancer, diabetes, and high blood pressure...
...These efforts have in several areas enabled Paraguay to substitute home-produced medicines for expensive imported drugs...
...Since folk healers are widely patronized by members of their communities, the scientific enhancement of their treatments would effectively extend the reach of modern medicine in backward areas...
...Inaddition, they have led to the establishment of postgraduate courses that arc attracting specialists from across Latin America and the Caribbean.—THOMAS LAND...
...A second promising discovery at Dakar is a low-cost laxative derived from the local lam plant, which could cut Senegal's annual drug import bill by another $210,000...
...Their efforts could lead to the establishment of an indigenous pharmaceutical industry...
...Proj ects under the aegis of the WHO in other parts of the Third World have already yielded substantial payoffs...
...Paraguayan researchers at Asuncion University have identified over 3,500 potent medicinal plants used in time-honored folk remedies...
...The Kenyan scientists are participating in an ambitious program coordinated by the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) here in Geneva that involves universities and medical research institutions around the globe...
...Consequently in Kenya, besides seeking to develop a pharmacopoeia of hundreds of remedies drawn from a vast range of plants, experimenters will break new ground by subjecting the diagnosis and treatment of cooperating medicine men to carefully controlled scrutiny...
...Herbal Healing Geneva—For countless generations African folk healers have made use of a variety of plant-extract mixtures in treating the sick, often with impressive results...
...Crucial to the undertaking is a computerized international database giving researchers in developing countries access to the latest findings in the chemistry and pharmacology of medicinal plants...
...The plants could even be cultivated for export, providing desperately needed foreign exchange...
...Thedatabase is maintained by the WHO's Collaborating Center for Traditional Medicine at the University of Illinois (Chicago) under the direction of Professor Norman R. Farnsworth...
...In India, scientists have isolated an anticancer agent from the root extract of the native plumbago zeylanica plant...
...One group, working jointly with the Institute of Pharmaceutical Biology in Munich, is focusing on herbal treatments for heart and liver disorders, rheumatism, arthritis, and diseases of the nervous system...
...Now scientists at Kenya's Medical Research Institute are about to launch a series of clinical trials aimed at identifying the active principal in some of these concoctions...
...The syrup could be sold locally at half the price of the imports and would save the country an estimated $421,000 a year in foreign exchange...
...Trials on rats and mice have shown that the compound—a thousand times more powerful than cancer treatments derived from other herbs—can reduce tumor growth by 70 per cent...
...Their accumulated experience (and office) has been passed along from father to son, shrouded in jealous secrecy...
...Thescientists are honor-bound to respect the secrecy of their collaborators...
...Beyond its commercial aspects, the WHO program hopes to exploit the cultural acceptability of ancient medical practices...
...In Senegal, for example, scientists at the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy at the University of Dakar have produced and tested a cough syrup based on the indigenous gueira plant that has proved as effective as codeine-based drugs imported from North America and Europe...
...Distinguishing those that are safe and efficacious could enable poor countries to meet many of their medical needs with native resources, and thus sharply reduce burdensome drug import bills...
...The potential benefits of the project are enormous, both in Kenya and elsewhere in the Third World...
...In experiments conducted in the United States it has proved effective, too, in prolonging the life of rats with induced lymphocytic leukemia...
Vol. 69 • November 1986 • No. 17
