Medicinal plants and public health policies: new perspectives on old practices

Abstract

Medicinal plants have been used in health care since Antiquity, but it was only in the 1970s that the WHO expressed its importance for the health of the population. This article aimed to identify the temporal sequence and evolution of legal frameworks associated with public policies on medicinal plants, discussing the implications of this evolution, as well as its insertion in the health system, and to present this evolution in Brazil. The contents of Laws, Decrees, Resolutions, Policies, Ordinances and Normative Instructions related to the topic were identified and analyzed. Despite the long history of using the national flora, the first legislation on its use in the health field is recent. Only in 2006, Brazil, the country with the greatest biodiversity on the planet, approved the National Policy on Integrative and Complementary Practices and the National Policy on Medicinal Plants and Phytotherapeutics. It is necessary, however, to increase investment in scientific research so that there is safety, quality and effectiveness in its use.