A Drug Map of the World 



. Roland M. Harper 



The National Wholesale Druggists' Association has recently 

 published a drug map of the world, by Edwin L.Newcomb, meas- 

 uring about three by five feet, and intended to be displayed in 

 drug store windows during "National Pharmacy Week" (the 

 third week in October). The map shows the approximate source 

 of about 225 standards drugs, by means of their names inserted 

 at the proper places. The drugs named are nearly all crude 

 drugs of vegetable origin, "official" (officinal) in the United 

 States Pharmacopeia or the National Formulary. No inorganic 

 products, and only three or four of animal origin, are included. 

 There are also three which might be said to belong to both the 

 vegetable and animal kingdoms, namely, nut-galls, and white 

 and yellow wax (the two last being different forms of beeswax). 



There are of course all gradations between the most im- 

 portant vegetable drugs and those which are of imaginary value 

 or inert, and the number officially recognized varies in the phar- 

 macopoeias of difterent countries and in the same country at 

 different times, with a tendency to reduce the number from 

 time to time as synthetic products and surgical processes are 

 substituted for the old herb medicines. New discoveries in medic- 

 inal plants are rare, and most of our vegetable drugs have been 

 known for a century or more, and some since pre-historic times. 



In some cases two or more different drugs are yielded by the 

 same plant, or the same drug ma}' appear in the trade in differ- 

 ent forms, such as powder, tincture, oil, etc. On the other hand, 

 the same drug or its equivalent may come from either of two 

 or more related species, and occasionally from different genera 

 or families.^ Although Dr. Newcomb's selection includes some 

 drugs which are no longer in the U. S. Pharmacopoeia, but may 

 still be articles of commerce, and omits several officinal plants 

 (perhaps because there was not room for them all on the map), 

 such discrepancies may not seriously affect the following gen- 

 eralizations. 



^ Two striking casesof this are anise, from P/w^meWa ^w/smot of Europe 

 and Illicium verum of eastern Asia, and storax, formerly derived from Styrax 

 officinalis of western Asia (said to be now nearly extinct), and now from two 

 species of Liqtiidambar. 



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