Accessome
In 2022, there were almost twenty million known cases of cancer worldwide. The recorded deaths were aproximated at the staggering number of 9.7 million. Cancer is the second leading cause of death, with cardiovascular diseases being first.
Cancer is truly the disease of the century, and for a very good reason. Popularized unhealthy habbits like drinking, smoking and eating unhealthy meals have been proven to be important factors in the development of this distructive afliction. The sedentary lifestyle provided by urbanization also plays a part, as excess body weight seems to indicate a higher risk of developing the dreaded cancer. Fortunatly, awerness has increased in the past decade, the focus of the masses shifting to this subject due to the increased efforts of several campaigns. More services are provided by goverments and institutions in order to spot and resolve more treatable forms of cancer early on, and care for those who are aflicted can be offered by charities. There is an obvious discrepancy between developed and less developed countries when it comes to how and who recieves the resourcess needed to prevent and treat pacients, as 2012 data shows 57% of the cases and 65% of deaths are accounted to the furthest option. Challenges that arise for impoverished or marginalized comunities, such as great distances between the home and hospitals or negative experiences in institutions can lead to the escalation of the disease. Thats why some communities tried resolving the problem in a manner that was accesible to them. In South Africa, plants had to become the main medicine for cancer-related issues for the impoverished, and the efectivity they have proven to have caught the attention of mainstream researchers looking in to the problem.
What is Cancer
To better understand what impact natural medicine may have, we first have to know what cancer is. Cancer is a disease in which some of the body’s cells grow uncontrollably and spread to other parts of the body. Cancer can start almost anywhere in the human body, which is made up of trillions of cells. The unhealthy lifestyle discussed earlier make this disease very prominent in urbanised communities, but that doesn’t mean there are less cases in rural establishments.
How Plants can Change the Course for Cancer Treatment
For those that couldn’t access reliable care, options were limited. Some had to rely on alternative medicine, using plants to try to heal the disease or just calm the pain. Some of the natural resources used have proven to be surprisingly efficient, so much so that they now might influence current research in the cancer treatment field.
At this moment, only 23 of the herbs that belong to the African flora were analysed for their supposed cancerous properties, but there are many others that might have the same abilities. Some of these plants are Dicoma anomala, a perennial herb, Fagaropsis which are shrubs or deciduous trees with buttress roots, Tribulus terrestris, which is a small, silky, and hairy herb, Portulaca oleracea, which is an annual succulent plant and Withania somnifera, a small, bushy, evergreen shrub. These plants differ in many ways, but the most important aspect they all have in common is their ability to fight of cancerous cells. The herbs contain high level of chemical compounds, such as phenolic acids, phytosterols or flavonoids, which, in different contexts, can facilitate processes that damage the cancerous formations or prevent their further development. For example, Tribulus terrestris has a high content of steroidal saponins which have been shown to induce programmed cell death. Similarly, Ethanol extracts of the roots of Withania somnifera were shown to inhibit the multiplication of certain lung cancer cells through the downregulation of PI3K, a family of enzymes involved in cell growth control.
Nature and Medicine in the Modern Context
It might seem as if medicine derived from natural compounds is a reality that exists only in the premises of rural and traditional communities, but, surprisingly, over 25% of drugs used for combating human diseases are directly sourced from plants and another 25% are chemically modified natural products. Anti-cancer medicine is no exception, as more than 60% of contemporary anticancer drugs, in one form or another, have originated from natural sources. As the limits of medicine are explored further and further, it is important to acknowledge the methods and resources that shaped the field when nothing else was available. Alternative medicine has been the only form of addressing diseases for centuries, and for some it still is. These methods that were developed over time are not to be ignored or pushed behind: nature often holds the key to our wellbeing, and past research doesn’t have to become history.