Drug Adulteration
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Medicinal plants constitute an effective source of tradi-tional (e.g. ayurvedic, chinese, homeopathy and unani) and modern medicine. Herbal medicine has been shown to have genuine utility. Germany and France, together represent 39% of the $14 billion global retail market.
Drug
Adulteration
INTRODUCTION
Medicinal plants constitute an effective source of
traditional (e.g. ayurvedic, chinese, homeopathy and unani) and modern
medicine. Herbal medicine has been shown to have genuine utility. Germany and
France, together represent 39% of the $14 billion global retail market. In
India, about 80% of the rural population depends on medicinal herbs and/or
indigenous systems of medicine. In fact today, approximately 70% of ‘synthetic’
medicines are derived from plants. Popularity among the common people increased
the usage of medicinal plants/herbal drugs. Herbal adulteration is one of the
common malpractices in herbal raw-material trade. Adulteration is described as
intentional substitution with another plant species or intentional addition of
a foreign substance to increase the weight or potency of the product or to
decrease its cost. In general, adulteration is considered as an intentional
practice. However, unintentional adulterations also exist in herbal raw-material
trade due to various reasons, and many of them are unknown even to the
scientific community. The present chapter deals with different intentional and
unintentional adulterations, reasons behind them and methods for easy
identification of the spurious plant and authentication of the authentic plant.
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