Traditional herb use for medical purposes as popular as ever
301 views · Published 6 November 2018 · 5:46 · Indexed 9 October 2026
Channel: AP Archive · 2018 · News & Politics
(1 Nov 2018) LEADIN: Traditional knowledge of plants and herbs has been used for medicinal purposes for centuries in Russia. Despite advances in medicine production, in recent years more and more people are turning to nature for their healing and wellbeing. STORYLINE: Larisa Ovchinnikova is a wildcrafter. She has been collecting herbs from the wilderness near her small village in Nizhny Novgorod since childhood. "Because today is such a beautiful sunny day I have decided to collect herbs," she says. Collecting herbs is a family tradition passed on to her by her mother and grandmother. Summer and autumn are busy times for herbalists. Plants and herbs have been used for medicinal puproses for centuries in Russia. In recent years the trend to turn back to nature for healing and wellbeing is growing. Ovchinnikova is a strong believer in the medicinal powers of herbs. "When herbs are laid to dry they develop more healing qualities and when you put them into the mix they give all the healing grace the body needs. And the body will absorb what is needed," she says. After her herb picking session, she returns home to lay her herbs out to dry. The plants are carefully arranged in her attic, away from sunlight. Once dried, they will be sorted out and packed into storage bags. Different herb mixes are recommended for different ailments. Vladimir Ovchinnikov's herbalist father-in-law documented his herb wisdom in a journal from the 1980s. "This is one of the books and he had lots of such books. They have recipes and what he gave to people," Ovchinnikov says. These days things have changed, warns Nikolay Abramychev, Head of the Department of Neurological Diseases of the Central District Hospital in Semenov. Herbs are not as safe to take as before, as they are exposed to pollution and other elements. "Now I think the level of ecology is such that you should not trust only herbs that are collected in our region. There may be pollution and radiation and everything else," he says. In Soviet times, pharmacies accepted medicinal herbs from wildcrafters and sold them to their customers. But that practice is now over. "Our pharmacies, our network do not take medicinal herbs from the public, and the same happens with everyone else too. In the past, there used to be a practice of packing the herbs (in the pharmacies), but now we do not do it anymore. Or herbal medicines are coming to us already packaged and we do not accept them from the public," says pharmacist Galina Zakirova. Despite warnings from doctors to not self-medicate, herbal remedies are as popular as ever among the Russian population. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/ You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/602e8f86892e101715c5c691ddfe5064
