Traditional Medicine in Asia

Traditional Medicine in Asia
been clearly brought out by Handa in his
contribution to the Regional Consultation
on Development of Traditional Medicine in
South-East Asia Region held in New Delhi
from 14–17 September, 1999. 2 Bottlenecks
in the standardization of herbal drugs
include dependence on wild sources for the
plants leading to variation in quality,
adulteration and substitution of the active
plant material by inactive, cheaper varieties
of non-medicinal plants, and in many cases
incorrect identification of the plant itself.
This is because the same plant may have
different local names at different locations
while sometimes different plants have the
same local name. A good example of the
latter is that the plant which is commonly
known as Punarnava, a quality-of-life
enhancer, is collected under the botanical
name of Boerhaavia diffusa and also
collected under the name Trianthema
portulacastrum (Vishakarpara). This would
certainly lead to problems in standardizing
Boerhaavia diffusa if some Trianthema
portulacastrum is also contained in the
sample.
The loss in medicinal plants due to
ecological degradation has led to a
shortage of the actual plants and
substitution by other non-medicinal plants.
One example is the preparation of a herbal
drug from the bark of the plant Caesalpinia
sappan (Patranga). When this bark is
collected, the bark from other plants such
as Pterocarpus marsupium (Vijayasara),
Gluta travancorica and Toona ciliata
(Nandivriksha) or Cedrela toona are
substituted for Caesalpinia sappan. Other
examples which have been found in India
relate to the substitution of the bark of
Saraca indica (Ashok) by the bark of
Trema orientalis (Jivanti) and substitution
of the plant Holarrhena antidysenterica
(Kutaja) by the plant Wrightia tinctoria (Asita
kutaja). Similar instances of adulteration
210
can be seen in many countries of South-
East Asia.
The need for standardization has long
been recognized. The World Health
Organization organized an Inter-Regional
Meeting on Standardization and Use of
Medicinal Plants at Tianjin in China in
November 1980. 3 Participants clearly
pointed out the problems relating to
standardization of herbal medicines and
the tremendous need for immediate work
in this field. A second conference, also
organized by the Western Pacific Regional
Office of the World Health Organization
at Tokyo in 1986, identified three areas of
priority research. 4 Research on standardization
was one of these areas. Standardization,
it was stressed, means standardization
of the raw material, standardization
of the method of production and quality
control of the final product. The Regional
Consultation at New Delhi held in 1999 [2]
again highlighted the need for standardization
but added some new features to this
issue.
Parikh 2 in his presentation at the New
Delhi meeting organized by the World
Health Organization made a strong plea
for cultivation of medicinal plants rather
than collection from the wild. Standardization
of herbal preparations from plants
which are cultivated would be easier for
the following reasons. The availability of the
plant material would be assured and the
supplies could be controlled. The quality
of such plants would be reliable, identification
totally accurate and adulteration
would not be an issue. Further, in this
system the environment would be maintained.
Other possible advantages would
be the possibility, in these controlled
conditions, of carrying out agronomic
manipulation and genetic improvement.
A reference was also made by Parikh 2
to the global market for medicinal plant