Grandmother is always right is not a cliche. It is a lifetime of decoction of experience. When it comes to curing disease, decoction of herbs and spices prove to be potions of life--to make us healthy and wise. Modern medical science, as this century closes, has begun to take a turnabout in its assessment of what anecdotal herbal medicine holds for mankind. Long an accepted method of treating illnesses in the subcontinent, it is now an established science worldwide.

The advent of allopathic medicine did much to digress from the utility of anecdotal medicine because it was not based on the principles considered objective by the scientists. Having gone through dramatic developments in allopathic medicine, we find that we have not dramatically improved the lives of people. The first observation is that we are still dying. And if we remove the statistical manipulation of infant mortality question, we are also not living any longer than our forefathers of a hundred years ago. This observation triggered many studies to ascertain what allowed the homo sapiens to survive the rigors of disease when there was no modern allopathic medicine--in the yore of no vaccines, no x-rays, no heart transplants. In an attempt to bring closer the whims of Nature and man's proclivity, we find that Nature has been very kind to us. Wherever man lived, Nature provided a cure for the diseases around him because the Neandertal man of Europe was not able to fly out to Houston for a cardiac bypass--hundred thousand years ago. It seems that the disease and its cure form a close cycle; diseases caused by curative agents and diseases inducing profileration of curative agents in the vicinity.

The bond between a lactating mother and her suckling infant is a classical example of this theory. When infants develop infection, mother's body produces antibodies which are fed through breast milk. Mother Nature to us does the same. How it is organized and conducted is still a mystery like so many other unfathomable plans of Nature.

Using nature to treat ailments is justifiably the oldest branch of medicine. Animals and humans have used it instinctively for thousands of years. Penicillin has been in use for thousands of years, rauwolfia has for centuries been recognized as having tranquilizing effects, curare is a known as an anesthetics used as poison on darts and arrows, digitalis is derived from the foxglove and morphine from the opium poppy--for many generations. Quinine from cinchona bark has long been there to cure malaria and pain killers like aspirin were known to man ages ago. Another example is use of yam tubers for birth control.

Considered a gift from gods, herbal healing usually involved purification rites and prayers since man began walking on earth. Historically, it were priests, shamans, and the wise women who knew how to use medicinal plants. Perhaps the earliest record of use of herbs is a Sumerian tablet from around 2500 BC listing popular herbs of the era. Emperor Shen Nung of China first discovered medicinal herbs as we find written in The Classical Herbal written around 2700 BC. Herbal lore of the third and fourth centuries BC contain Indian and Persian influences. Most of the Egyptian remedies recorded in the Ebers Papyrus around 1550 BC are herbal. The sacred Hindu book Rig Veda dating back to 1000 BC also includes medicinal herbs.

Early in the history, herbs and spices played an important role in establishing trade routes. In 1485 BC, Egypt's queen Hatshepsut sent sailing vessels along the Nile River to collect East African myrrh trees for a garden terrace. Trade throughout Arabia, Egypt and the entire Middle East advanced greatly around 1000 BC when the donkey was replaced by Camel which could carry as much as 500 pounds of load. The route between south Arabia and the markets of Syria and Egypt was called "incense route;" the "amber route" between the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea. Many medical writings from India in the fourth century BC include Susruta, Charaka. The trade between Rome and India was brisk through the "silk route." The fall of the Roman Empire halted much progress in Europe while Muslims spread a wealth of medicinal knowledge into northern Africa and Spain. The prophet Mohammed (570-632 AD) (pbuh) himself was one a spice merchant who led camel caravans. With expansion of Islam the use of spices for food and medicine spread widely. In 635, the Muslims captured Syria, Persia and Basra, which became thriving ports of trade with India.

Avicenna (980-1037 AD), the founder of an Arabic medical school that incorporated Greek studies wrote the Canon Medicine which became the standard text in European universities. This was also the era when cultivation of herbs took steep rise in India. Greek medicine, supplemented with Arabic thought was finally revived by eleventh and twelfth century European scholars though centuries of copying had began to take toll on its accuracy. In India the trade and development of herbal medicine continued with vigor and much of the discoveries survived generations of practitioners.

By the middle of the 19th century at least 80% of all medicines were derived from plants worldwide. Then began the chemical era. Scientists began looking at the chemistry of herbs and started purifying the crude concoctions to pure chemical molecules--the magic bullets of the 20th century. Based on the knowledge gained about the structure of drugs, many new drug molecules were synthesized--the designer drugs. Last quarter of a century has seen deployment of genetic engineering to create new drugs. While the tilt in the West swayed to chemistry from holistic treatment, the interest in the herbal treatment waned. In a turnabout as a result of knowing that human body has its own power to heal, herbalism is fighting back. It is already a $20 billion industry in the United States.

While the West experimented with alterante medicines, the major core of cures available to Pakistanis remained the herbal medicine. Today, this mode of treatment fully thrives in South Asia. Pakistan now has its first university of tibb (herbal medicine) that assures that much of the past thousands of years of knowledge shall continue to be honed upon and not lost.

The problem with Herbalism is that it is still a science in its infancy; there are over 350,000 plants, only 10,000 have been investigated for their medicinal value. Though anecdotal use has established dosing regimens for some medicines, much remains to be standardized. There remains the hazard of overdosing or poisoning in the hands of inxperienced users.

Unfortunately, this revered science of curing is beginning to fall into hands of exploiters in Pakistan. Devoid of knowledge about herbs but fully cognizant of monetary rewards to be gained, many self-claimed tabibs have sprung all over the country. Mixing many strong allopathic medicines with their crude concoctions, these quacks are outright hazard to health, specially of those who can not afford any thing else. One of the most common additive to herbal medicines is steroids which are a panacea for all diseases in the allopathic medicine. Unfortunately, once used, no other treatment will work and since the only effect of steroids is to provide relief to symptoms and not alleviate disease, most patients end up becoming dependent or even worse incurable. The total import of steroids in Pakistan is about 10 times of what goes into registered pharmaceutical medicines; much more is smuggled into country. Just controlling supply of steroids can do wonders to the health of people and bring back respect and reverence to this age-proven modality of treatment.

The laws of the government further encourage exploitation of herbal medicines. Whereas the allopathic medicines are closely controlled by the government, no restrictions apply to herbal medicines. As a result, many manufacturers have begun commercial marketing of at best worthless and at worse hazardous combinations of drugs.

If you can find a good tabib who will not be exploiting allopatic medicines, you should feel fortunate.