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Shaman in Brazil
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MEDICINAL PLANT KNOWLEDGE OF NATIVE PEOPLE
One of the most exciting areas of research in tropical forests is ethnobotany which is the study of how people use native plants to treat illness and disease. Forest people have an incredible knowledge of medicinal plants with remedies for everything from snake bites to tumors.
To date many of the prescription drugs used in the western world have been derived from plants and 70% of the plants identified as having anti-cancer characteristics by the US National Cancer Institute are found only in the tropical rainforest.
Typically knowledge of medicinal plants is carried by the shaman or "medicine man" of a village. The shaman treats the sick often during elaborate ceremonies and rituals using plants gathered from the surrounding forest.
The Mongabay Kids site (kids.mongabay.com) aims to help children learn about rainforests and the environment. This site is still under development and I am working to add additional content as time permits. If you have comments or are interested in submitting educational content for the site, please feel free to contact me.
The site is available in many different languages, including Portuguese, Chinese, French, Spanish, Japanese, and German.
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