Pharmacy in the jungle study reveals indigenous people’s choice of medicinal plants

In one of the most diverse studies of the non-random medicinal plants selection by gender, age and exposure to outside influences from working with ecotourism projects, researchers worked with the Kichwa communities of Chichico Rumi and Kamak Maki in the Ecuadorian Amazon. They discovered a novel method to uncover the intracultural heterogeneity of traditional knowledge while testing the non-random selection of medicinal plants and exploring overuse and underuse of medicinal plant families in these communities.