Can poisonous plants be used for treatments?
Long before the present day, plants of all sorts have been used for healing. In many cultures, the shaman, or medicine person, held the power of the plants to heal the sick. This power was the knowledge they possessed about which plants were safe and which were poisonous. In the witch trials of the 1600s, many women of the towns were tried and found guilty as witches because they knew and utilized their knowledge of plants to heal. These natural healing tonics (sometimes called the witches’ brew) worked so well they became mistakenly suspect as magic. Among many people today, there is a rising interest in natural healing and in the use of herbs (which are plants), and other plants for healing outside of and in cooperation with medical and health sciences. Medical providers studied the ancient shamans and medicine people’s plant healings by working side by side with them as well as researching them within the study of medical anthropology. From these studies and other scientific studies
