The coastland times with which is combined the pilot and herald of Belhaven and Swan Quarter. [volume] (Manteo, N.C.) 1959-1973, 1961-03-03
SCIENTISTS TAKE A
NEW LOOK AT ANCIENT
MEDICINAL PLANTS

| WASHINGTON - Wah0O bark
may be on the way out, but snake
root and other old remedies are
coming into their own as medicines,
Wahoo bark, once widely used to
stimulate the liver, has waned in
popularity. A species of snakeroot
(Rauwolfia serpentina), however,
is increasingly in demand as a
source of tranquilizing drugs.
For centuries medicine men in
India prescribed snakeroot for
emotional disturbances, the Nation
al Geographic Society reports. But
the root did not come to the atten
ton of Western chemists until
about 10 years ago when their tests
showed it contains reserpine, an eff
fective sedative.
Search for Simples
The success of snakeroot has
aroused new interest in medicinal
plants, or simples, and touched off
a wide search for them. Most folk
remedies have proved largely use
less; many are dangerous. Others,
however, are beneficial.
In the past decade, the value of
drugs produced from plants has
risen from about $5O,0OO,OO0 a year
to $250,0O0,000. The major drug
companies are inclined to listen to
the elderly Blue Ridge Mountain
herbalist who said, " 'Tain't nothin'
grows amt good for something"
Pharmaceutical firms send scouts
to the jungles of Africa, South
America, India-and to the hills of
Kentucky. They talk shop with
medicine men and herbalists, and
look for promising plants.
The Mexican yam is an import
ant find. The tuber is a source of
diosgenin, which yields cortisone
as we'll as other hormones and Ste
roids used in treating rheumatic
diseases and some forms of cancer.
African natives long have used
willow bark tea to relieve the pain
Of rheumatism. They claim that the
graceful, flexible willow transfers
it's attributes to the stiff joints of
the patient. Physicians scoffed un-
til they found salicin, pain-killing
drug, in the bark.
Africans also treat rheumatism
with meadow saffron. The British
find it valuable for govt, an afflict-
ion more common in England than
Africa.
AS long ago as 5000 years, Chi
nese doctors dispensed ma huang,
an herbal drug containing ephe
drine, now prescribed in combating
asthma and hay fever.
Indian Druggists
The Collahuaya Indians of South
America are known as the "drug.
lgists of the Amazon" They make
excellent cough medicine from GER
tain tree banks, and invigorating
tonic from sarsaparilla roots, and a
powerful poison, curare, from
plants of the Strychnos family. Gu
rare is widely used as a muscle
relaxer.
While herb hunters concentrate
on the profusion of plants in tropi-
cal regions, they do not ignore the
temperate zones. Foxglove tea, fol-
Example, was recommended fol-
weak hearts in Wales long before
heart, stimulant lin leaves of the
lplant.
Plant detectives read medieval
herbals for clues to old remedies
that may actually be useful. Rem
aissance herbalists recommended
tamong, other things, marsh mari
lgolds for toothache; French laven-
der for headache, apoplexy, and
|"falling sicknesse"; juice of lily
root for snake bite; onion juice for
badness and burns.
Modern drug researchers may
even be able to verify that Euro
lpean cucumber soup is, as one her
balist claimed, a cure for "red and
fierie noses"