In 1860, Oliver Wendell Holmes pointedly expressed himself to the Massachusetts Medical Society: “I firmly believe that if the whole Material Medica, as now used, could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be all the better for mankind, and all the worst for the fishes.” Should one think the same about the current approach in drug discovery from plants? Probably yes. Despite the spending of billions of US dollars, and three decades of efforts, high-throughput screenings have only allowed the discovery of a couple of drugs. One could have reasonably expected the discovery of an arsenal of drugs from the millions of plant extracts randomly tested, but “hits” can be inactive in vitro or too toxic, some molecules need to be metabolized first to be active, and false-positive and false-negative results are common. The bitter truth is that the robotic approach in discovering drugs from plants has proven, to date, its inability to excavate the hundreds of molecules that will contribute to the health progress of Man. However, one can reasonably see that the last patches of primary rainforest on earth hold still hundreds of spectacularly active drugs that await discovery.

From the reviews:

"This book contains brief descriptions and evaluations of some active ingredients and the medicinal uses of about 100 plants found in Asia … . The stated purpose is to show the rich source of potential drugs in the estimated 6,000 plant species in Asia … . This objective is met … . A unique feature of the book is the emphasis on similar chemicals found in some plant families … . Adequate references to the scientific literature are given for each plant." (Stata Norton, Doody’s Book Review Service, January, 2007)

"This book presents several aspects of the pharmacology, chemistry, botany and folkloric use of selected medicinal plants that can be found in Asia and the Pacific. It is generously illustrated with line drawings for many of the plants under discussion, as well as examples of chemical structures. … The book is organized into three chapters … . This book should be of interest to academic, industrial or government scientists with an interest in the potential of the regional flora for drug discovery." (James Graham, Phytomedicine, Vol. 15, 2008)