[MPWG] 2 ARTICLES on climate change and U.S. medicinal plants

[De Angelis, Patricia]

Scientistsʼ Warning on Climate Change and Medicinal Plants
Wendy L. Applequist, Josef A. Brinckmann, Anthony B. Cunningham, Robbie E. Hart, Michael Heinrich, David R. Katerere, Tinde van Andel
Planta Medica, January 2020
The recent publication of a World Scientistsʼ Warning to Humanity highlighted the fact that climate change, absent strenuous mitigation or adaptation efforts, will have profound negative effects for humanity and other species, affecting numerous aspects of life. In this paper, we call attention to one of these aspects, the effects of climate change on medicinal plants. These plants provide many benefits for human health, particularly in communities where Western medicine is unavailable. As for other species, their populations may be threatened by changing temperature and precipitation regimes, disruption of commensal relationships, and increases in pests and pathogens, combined with anthropogenic habitat fragmentation that impedes migration. Additionally, medicinal species are often harvested unsustainably, and this combination of pressures may push many populations to extinction. A second issue is that some species may respond to increased environmental stresses not only with declines in biomass production but with changes in chemical content, potentially affecting quality or even safety of medicinal products. We therefore recommend actions including conservation and local cultivation of valued plants, sustainability training for harvesters and certification of commercial material, preservation of traditional knowledge, and programs to monitor raw material quality in addition to, of course, efforts to mitigate climate change.
Link: https://www.thieme-connect.com/products/ejournals/html/10.1055/a-1041-3406

Implications of Climate Change for Medicinal Plant Distribution and Composition
by Mariann Garner-Wizard
HerbalGram, July 2020; American Botanical Council
In 1992, the Union of Concerned Scientists published a “World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity,” with 1,575 signatories that alerted the public that human damage to the Earth, its resources, and its lifeforms must be curbed to avoid catastrophe. In 2017, a second notice, with 15,364 signatories from 184 nations, noted that few concerns raised in the 1992 statement had been adequately addressed, and most had worsened. They named climate change (CC) as one of the major threats. After the publication of the second notice, the Alliance of World Scientists called for additional, discipline-specific “Scientists’ Warnings” that highlight effects of CC on environmental and human well-being. Early responses addressed impacts on wetlands, microbial communities, and wildfire regimes. In January 2020, the journal Planta Medica published a new Scientists’ Warning that assessed threats to medicinal plants due to CC, habitat loss, and overharvesting.

Link: http://cms.herbalgram.org/herbalgram/issue126/hg126-resrvw-climate.html

Second article, courtesy: American Botanical Council
https://abc.herbalgram.org/site/SPageServer/;jsessionid=00000000.app20052b?NONCE_TOKEN=07CA7688236CA542F7A041A2E54A1051&pagename=About_Us
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