The Power of Herbs Essay

Now the United States has a shorter history of medical herbal use. Native American’s, and early European’s used herbs as medicines.

An increasing number of medical schools are now offering courses in alternative medicine for their students, and some hospitals already have alternative medicine departments. The availability of healers and doctors practicing holistic medicine has also increased in recent years, and more and more people are educating themselves in these new fields. In fact, the World Health Organization estimates that between 65 and 80 percent of the world’s population (about 3 billion people) rely on traditional medicine as their primary form of health care.

During the Elizabethan Era, witches were considered evil burdens to society. It was thought that witches worshipped the devil and used their supernatural powers to commit crimes against the community. They were often held responsible for deaths, illnesses, and other mishaps that occurred within the community. Many citizens hated witches for these misfortunes, even though witches had no control over these accidents. Many times witches were severely punished for committing these crimes and they could even be sentenced to death.

Many monasteries had herb gardens. The monks used their knowledge of medicine from the books in their libraries to make herbal remedies. However, there is little evidence of them being able to make new cures for disease.

Many people find thyme useful and effective when it comes to heal and treat many diseases. Thyme is a member of the most common herbs in the Labiatae (Mint) plant family, which have been used for centuries. In addition to that, there are about 350 species of thyme with a vast range of uses not only in natural medicine but also in pharmaceutical drugs. Thyme leaves are not the only part that have been used. In fact, oil extract from thyme leaves and its flowers also serves important roles in treating and curing many disorders.

Herbs have been used throughout the ages not just for their culinary benefits. In the use of magick and healing certain herbs and plants are used for their spirits or characteristics.

Alas, everything good is accompanied by something bad. In this context, medicine comes along with poisons. When physicians experimented with plants, they discovered some had healing properties while others had dangerous toxins. Therefore, plants and herbs were used in medicines and poisons frequently during the Elizabethan era for things such as war and pain relievers.

Herbal remedies-aromatic plants that may be used by people from all ethno cultural traditional backgrounds as one method of restoring physical health. (Africa)

Medicinal herbs were used to cure an array of illnesses such as wounds and helped in relieving pain. However, the effectiveness of such herbs were limited because they could not help in curing infections. Infections were a main reason behind the deaths of people in the past because once a person was infected, there was no way to deal with that infection and cure it. That is how thousands of

The plant species that I researched was Medicago sativa, or more commonly known as Alfalfa. I found this to be a very intriguing plant to research because we grow alfalfa on the farm as a fodder feed for the animals but I had no idea that it had such a practical use in modern medicine. It is believed that alfalfa was first grown somewhere within the Middle East and then spread to Europe and parts of Asia, the colonists brought it over from Europe to America. And today it can be found in nearly every continent used to feed livestock. The leaves of Alfalfa are what is beneficial in the use of medicine.The leaves are known to have positve affects on the digestive system and can help to lower cholesterol. They also aide with the cleansing the

Shamanistic healing, one of the oldest spiritual healing powers, has recently become a topic of interest in modern medicine.

Transition: Now that we have discussed the history of herbal medicine I would like to tell you some common herbs and uses in modern day.

Although "Alternative" or "Complementary" medicine has been kept on the fringes of the medical sciences in the past, it is becoming increasingly more popular, and more reputable. Alternative medicines are those medical systems which are not taught to or practiced by most conventional medical doctors. Alternative medicines seemingly have always existed, changing and conforming to the current climate of society. There seems to be an almost endless number of alternative medicines, each with their own method of gaining perfect health. Often people who are dissatisfied with conventional medicine turn to alternative medicine for their medical needs. Many similarities link the diverse extremities of alternative medicine.

Herbalism or phytotherapy has many definitions but in essence is the interaction between humans and the plant kingdom (Hoffmann, 2003). Herbalism is based on three principles: 1. The correlation of the herb to the disease or disease picture, 2. The harmony the herb has to an organ system, and 3. The ability of the herb to assist healing in the body (Wood, 2018). Herbalism contains many different branches of which there is Chinese, Japanese, Tibetan and Ayurvedic branches, and is used to treat a wide variety of symptoms. Herbalists make their medication from plants and are dispensed in many

Herbal medicines are great alternative for commercially manufactured medicines available in the market. The major reason why herbal medicine differ from modern medicine is because they are produced with 100% natural content. Therefore the plant extract has all the medicinal values that are as effective as modern medicine. Commercially prepared drugs show results quickly but have numerous side effects. However herbal medicines don’t show any side