Synthetic Drugs vs. Natural Herbs

Modem medicines typically contain a single active ingredient which is produced by the pharmaceutical industry using chemical methods. The amount of the active ingredient is carefully controlled in such a medicine, and other substances are also used at optimum levels. Is there a place for old-fashioned herbs in modem medicine  

In the last several decades, most of the newly developed drags were connected to plants somehow the idea of the chemical structure may have originated there, or at times, they were the actual raw material. Among 1200 new drag molecules introduced in the past 25 years, about 30% was purely synthetic. The remaining 70% had human proteins, neurotransmitters, bacterial, fungal or plant compounds acting as primers. 

The large family of medicines known as nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drags (NS AID, 3.3) today also owes its existence to primitive observations about the effect of the willow Salix in Latin). In this case, it was not the original compound, but a chemical derivative that became a blockbuster drag. The taste of willow bark is bitter, and similar to the taste of the bark of a South American plant Cinchona, which is an effective treatment against malaria. As well as the taste, the effect was also similar willow bark seemed to possess an antifever property. Today, it has been established that salicin is the active ingredient, but a simpler derivative named acetylsalicylic acid proved to be more potent (— 3.25), and is currently sold under the trade name Aspirin. 

One of the most successful antitumor compounds is paclitaxel, whose structure is among the most complicated (Fig. 3.10). An anticancer screening study carried out in the US during the 1960s revealed that the extract of the bark of pacific yew (Tams brevifolia) shows very marked antitumor activity. The compound responsible for the effeets, paehtaxel, was duly isolated, but since the quantity in the bark was minisenle, its ehemieal structure was way too complicated for atty financially 

Older plant-derived drags sometimes lose their importance when modern, synthetic alternatives are developed, but many of them stiU have no significant competitor. Some of the plant products in widespread use do not only contain a single active substance, but a full plant extract, or even a concentrate. Some of the stories in this book describe the efficacy and safety issues coimected to these herbs 3.27,3.30). 

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