Botanical Insights: Human Health

A pictorial display of fascinating and informative insights into the world of botany will be on show in February, March, and April 2023 at The Treehouse Visitor Centre, Botanic Garden Ki Paekākā.

Explore how humans harnessed the medicinal powers of plants and fungi throughout history at the Botanical Insights exhibition. Many modern medicines have their genesis in plant- and fungus-based therapies practised hundreds, even thousands, of years ago.

In 3000-1500 BC the Egyptians and Sumerians used willow [Salix] as a pain reliever for non-specific aches and pains. Aspirin, first manufactured in 1897, uses the ‘willow chemical’ that the Ancients could never have known about.

An 11th century Persian philosopher promoted yew [Taxus] as a cardiac remedy. This was the first known use of a calcium channel blocker [CCB] drug to lower elevated blood pressure [hypertension]. Felodipine, a prescription medicine that uses the ‘yew chemical’, achieves this result in the modern day.

This exhibition looks at these things, and a lot more, in detail.