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Human uses of plants include both practical uses, such as for food, clothing, and medicine, and symbolic uses, such as in art, mythology and literature. Materials derived from plants are collectively called plant products .
Biodiversity plays a vital role in maintaining human and animal health because numerous plants, animals, and fungi are used in medicine to produce vital vitamins, painkillers, antibiotics, and other medications. [1] [2] [3] Natural products have been recognized and used as medicines by ancient cultures all around the world. [4]
In the Latin names for plants created by Linnaeus, the word officinalis indicates that a plant was used in this way. For example, the marsh mallow has the classification Althaea officinalis, as it was traditionally used as an emollient to soothe ulcers. [2] Pharmacognosy is the study of plant sources of phytochemicals.
[3] [47] The Food and Agriculture Organization estimated in 2002 that over 50,000 medicinal plants are used across the world. [48] The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew more conservatively estimated in 2016 that 17,810 plant species have a medicinal use, out of some 30,000 plants for which a use of any kind is documented. [49]
While many plants have been used for food, a small number of staple crops including wheat, rice, and maize provide most of the food in the world today. In turn, animals provide much of the meat eaten by the human population, whether farmed or hunted, and until the arrival of mechanised transport, terrestrial mammals provided a large part of the ...
Following a plant-based diet makes it easier to portion-control the foods that tend to be less healthy, like saturated fats and sugars, so you’re lowering risk for heart disease, Type 2 diabetes ...
Paraherbalism is the pseudoscientific use of extracts of plant or animal origin as supposed medicines or health-promoting agents. [ 1 ] [ 6 ] [ 7 ] Phytotherapy differs from plant-derived medicines in standard pharmacology because it does not isolate and standardize the compounds from a given plant believed to be biologically active.
Consult with medical professionals, conduct research, and tread carefully when deciding whether using cannabis to treat a medical condition is right for you. Story editing by Alizah Salario. Copy ...