Its benefits faded from public memory and the tree itself may even have been in danger of disappearing completely from the Thai landscape. But now makham pom, the Indian gooseberry (Emblic myrabolan), is a vital ingredient in the best-selling Abhaibhubejhr product ever: a cough syrup that has retained the No.1 spot for 75 months in a row. The cough-drops version doesn't do badly either, ranking among the top five for 42 months so far. Since it contains very high levels of vitamin C, this sour little berry is also used in many other products developed by the Prachin Buri hospital, from fruit juice and eye gel to a scalp-treatment oil and cream.
Makham pom is just one of the indigenous plants that has been given a new lease on life thanks to efforts by a small group of progressive-minded pharmacists and folk-medicine advocates over the past two decades. The advent of modern medicine in Thailand over a century ago inadvertently resulted in a gradual loss of knowledge about folk remedies and a decrease in people's ability to be self-reliant in terms of basic health care. Pharmacist Supaporn Pitiporn recalled how, at one stage, some universities were on the point of removing the study of herbs from the pharmacology curriculum, arguing that the subject no longer had any practical use.
She praised an older friend, Supoj Assawapantanakul, a core member of the Herbs for Self-reliance Project (once part of the Komol Kheemthong Foundation), for playing a vital role in researching and publicising the usefulness of common herbs back in the early 1980s. Thanks to his dedication, she said, the likes of turmeric, aloe vera, fah talai jone and several other plants were eventually incorporated by the government into its National Primary Healthcare Policy, adopted in alignment with the World Health Organisation's mandate of achieving ''Health For All by the Year 2000.''
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