Botanicals and Herbs: Food or Medicine?

Written records of the use of botanicals, herbs, and spices in medicine and food date back more than 5,000 years (Swerdlow 2000). Even as recently as 1890, 59% of the listings in the U.S. Pharmacopeia were from herbal products (Swerdlow 2000). It has been estimated that as many as one-third to one-half of currently used drugs were originally derived from plants (Barrett et al. 1999). According to the World Health Organization, traditional medicine is characterized by herbal remedies, which are t…