Cinchona tree Peruvian bark

Quinine was originally extracted from the bark of the Cinchona tree (Peruvian bark or Jesuits bark) and was used to treat ague, that is fever, usually due to malaria. It fell out of fashion with the advent of other antimalarial drugs, but has once again become the drug of first choice for malaria originating in areas with multiresistant Plasmodium falciparum. To be effective, quinine plasma concentrations greater than the minimal inhibitory concentration must be achieved and maintained. 

The medicinal use of quinine, an antimalarial agent, dates back over 350 years. Quinine is the chief alkaloid of cinchona, the bark of the South American cinchona tree, otherwise known as Peruvian bark, Jesuit s bark, or Cardinal s bark. In 1633, an Augustinian monk named Calan-cha of Lima, Peru, first wrote that a powder of cinchona given as a beverage, cures the fevers and tertians. By 1640, cinchona was used to treat fevers in Europe, a fact first mentioned in the European medical literature in 1643. The Jesuit fathers were the main importers and distributors of cinchona in Europe, hence the name Jesuit s bark. Cinchona also was called Cardinal s bark because it was sponsored in Rome by the eminent philosopher, Cardinal de Lugo. 

Quinine is an alkaloid compound used to treat malaria and other feverish ailments. It is a product of the bark of the Cinchona tree, a large evergreen originally found in South America. The bark alone is called Peruvian bark, and is used in powdered form to treat fevers. 

Now quinine is a natural substance found in the bark of the cinchona tree [native to South America]. And the genius of the business was to buy up the cinchona—Peruvian bark as they called it—at the cheapest possible price and then extract the qui-... 

During the seventeenth century the antimalarial activity of cinchona trivs growing wild in Peru was discovered. It is believed that Countess del Chinchon, wife of the Spanish Viceroy in Lima, Peru, was cured from severe attacks of malari.i by a remedy prepared from the bark of this native tree. Encouraged by the curatne effects of the Peruvian bark, the Spanish Viceroy introduced it in his homeland in 1639 for the treatment of ague. The powdered bark was later known as "/os Po/oos de la condesa" Subsequently, the Peruvian bark was widely used to cure "fevers" in... 

Quinine, 6-methoxycinchonine C20H24N2O2, is found in Peruvian bark, Cinchona spp. (Rubiaceae), a tree that originates in the Andes mountains. The major species used are Cinchona succirubra and C. ledgeriana. Quinidine is isomeric to quinine. 

Common/vernacular names Red bark, red Peruvian bark, cinchona rubra (C. pubescens), yellow bark, calisaya bark, ledger bark, brown bark, cinchona flava (C. calisaya and C. ledgeriana), Jesuit s bark, Peruvian bark, China bark, cortex chinae, and fever tree. 

In 1763 the use of willow tree bark was reported in more specific terms by Reverend Edward Stone in a lecture to the Royal Society in London. He used its extracts to treat the fever resulting from malaria (then common in Britain there are some marshes in the UK where the malarial mosquito still persists). He also found that it helped with the agues , probably what is now called arthritis. Other common medicines of the time included opium to relieve pain and Peruvian cinchona bark for fevers (it contained quinine). 

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