Introduction to Ethno-pharmacology

A GENERAL OUTLOOK ON ETHNO-PHARMACOLOGY

Ethno- is a prefix to mean people and culture. Ethnology- Branch of anthropology in which the
organization and culture of different races of people are studied and compared.
Ethno-pharmacology can therefore be defined as the study and comparison of people in the
different culture and the chemical agents (drugs) they use to modify the function of living things.
Ethno-pharmacology looks at the: Sources of the chemical agents, Processing of these sources,
storage, application and disposal of these chemical agents by the different communities of
people. Sources of chemical agents can be: Plants, animals, water, land (e.g. Soils, rocks) or the
atmosphere or a combination.
The sources of these pharmacologically active chemical may be used raw or may go through a
process of preparation before being used as medicine, this may serve to: Remove the toxic
compounds, concentrate the active compound or activate the in active form of the active
compound. This knowledge in the communities comes from pervious experiences, trial and error
or the observation of other wild animal species (dogs, monkeys) self medicate. However, over
the years as information is passed on from generation to generation, there is distortion of the
information (which may be good or bad depending on the result of the distortion).
It is therefore important to periodically update and document this information especially now
that population pressure is threatening to eliminate pharmacologically important plants, the
changes in economic and the extreme reliance on western type of medicine, the changes in
education patterns are also shifting away from the informal to formal education whose
curriculums do not include ethno-pharmacological studies until higher in the education ladder,
therefore the elderly persons and traditional medicine men/women die without passing this vital
information to the new generation.
Phytotherapy
Plants have produced very important drugs such as: Atropine, Tubocurarine, Strychinin, Digitalis
Vincristine and vinblatin. Fungi produced one of the most important drug Penicillins,
Chloraphenicols, Tetracycline, and Streptomycin, Ergot alkaloids.
The pharmacological industry continues to have something of a love-hate relation with natural
products. Because the compounds of natural sources have: weird and wonderful structures
(difficult to identify and name even by some of the most experienced chemists),the structures are
often near impossible to synthesize, difficult to get from their natural source of origin,
stabilizing and optimizing the compounds for therapeutic use is an uphill task.

Dr. Matovu Henry, Ethno-pharmacology

But the fact remains that nature unexpectedly provides some of the most useful drugs, and most
of natures potential remains untapped.
Zoo-therapy
This refers to the treatment of disease by therapeutics obtained or ultimately derived from
animals. Some of the products include: Cattle and goat milk, bee honey, fish oil, bee wax, snake
venoms, human urine, chicken egg, mammal horns. The use of several materials of animal origin
came to halt because of changes in the moral outlook of modern society.

Assignment 1
1. Discuss the following with respect to ethno-pharmacology in your culture or tribe
a) Geo-therapy
b) Hydro-therapy
2. Various methods of collecting indigenous knowledge
3. Discuss the methods of Traditional Medicine preservation and Storage in your Culture or
Tribe
Deadline and presentation: 9th, February, 2015

Dr. Matovu Henry, Ethno-pharmacology